Trump and 15 Davos Friends #1

Kent's Spring and tourism season off to a chilly start with a few days of snow and cold weather. But not quite as cold as Davos.

Perhaps though a foretaste of ingrained Climate Change with extended colder winters and hotter summers. Horrifyingly the Daily Mail citing 10,000 extra NHS deaths in just January and February - by way of context for that grim toll there are just 1,700 UK road deaths each year.

The bad weather all the more reason for greater UK Resilience efforts - the Johnson and Johnson Resilience Box a useful tool for every kitchen. And wider concerns over the National Grid and NHS database cyber attacks from the Salisbury spy poisonings - the UK with just 6 days of Winter gas supplies in reserve.

After the kerfuffle of UK and Russian embassy exchanges and Putin confirmed for another 6 years as Russian leader all the more reason eventually for a New Yalta on UK and EU and Russian relations, beyond merely NATO and KGB militarism.

Much as Morocco and its 2026 World Cup bid, is a fresh alternative to the rather too many moving parts bid of USA-Canada-Mexico, and could reframe UK and EU - if not the USA eastern seaboard from Maine to Miami on North and West Africa relations.

Sport proving its wider value in the United Korea teams at the Winter Olympics and in UK as a Sporting Superpower.

The Morocco bid not just effective in the transport links and reworking of stadium sites that proved vital in the success of London 2012 (surely with China 2008 the template for Olympics success?) but also the timezone factor for global television, radio and internet audiences.

Surely the Olympics and World Cup mega sports events requiring greater long-term planning for their success as the hosts rotate through the continents. I've written previously on the potential for Thailand and ASEAN for the 2030 decade World Cup and Olympics bids. Argentina already warming up on the touchline for the 2030 World Cup bid.

The first African hispeed rail already underway in Morocco would be completed by 2026, even all the way through to exisitng links in the port cities of Nouakchott in Mauritania and Dakar in Senegal.

Dakar, Africa's western-most port for the Americas, is crucial for West African trade and development of UNSDG30 through the resurgent economies of Sierra Leone and Liberia and Cote d'Ivoire to the mega-cities of Nigeria.

While a Gibraltar bridge would further integrate the EU economies with North and West Africa, much as the Channel Tunnel has done here in Kent. Trade from Manchester to Moscow to Marrakesh would be expedited as are the Cape to Cairo connections that deliver on the OBOR, China's new silk route.

Lord Bridges, is a keen fan of bridges, much as Asia and the Atlantic need metaphorical bridges, as in the David Cameron and George Osborne regime previously with new China funds, and AIIB and BlackRock.

Both Messrs Cameron and Osborne are welcome in Kent for their efforts previously in saving the Pfizer/Discovery park site here in East Kent, the largest USA inward investment in Europe dating back to the Marshall Plan, and the crunchy need for TB vaccine production in post-war Europe, rather than the subsequent Viagra production that once stiffened the sinews of a now rather limp Kent economy.

A wider rather than deeper EU encompassing Russia and the Mediterranean nations is surely the future of a United States of Europe. Much as the United States of America provides a federal overlay on state autonomy. An EU budget notionally doubled to 1% of European GDP is surely more bureaucratic bloat and national duplication than it's worth given Brexit concerns.

The silliness of Brexit now unravelling by the day with realistic fears of 30 mile HGV tailbacks from Dover, Kent and Europe's largest port requiring the Transport Minister to confirm there would be no extra border checks.

Simply confirming a transition [period until 2012 is hardly a breakthrough but rather very expensive politicians and civil servants achieving not very much since 2016.

While the Northern Ireland and Eire border of any Brexit descends into a fantasy of some unknown AI technology of the future. The Brexit aftershocks potentially reverberating through the Eire economy - Port Rosslare in County Wexford, Eire's Dover if you will, a key strategic interest in expanding trade through Dublin and Belfast.

Perhaps St Patrick's Day is an opportunity for leprechauns to staff the border. Cheaper too, requiring no more than a bowl of Lucky Charms and a splash of milk.

Leprechauns aside though - and the Irish tourism and foreign ministries understandably proud of the global event that it has become along with 61 extra Irish businesses in USA last year - POTUS Trump can set aside his tartan and Tam O'Shanter to wear his shamrock with pride as both the White House fountain and Chicago river turn green.

And surely it's not unreasonable for the Trump Davos 15 Friends from his Swiss Summit to tee off their activity in Europe and USA. A Davos Cup if you will.

First off the mark are Siemens, as detailed previously, with a new East Yorkshire rail factory and 700 UK jobs surely well-positioned for HS3 work to upgrade links across UK from Liverpool, Ireland's and USA's nearest UK port, with Hull, just completing its superb City of Culture work, as UK's nearest port for Scandinavia and Northern Europe.

Leaving Ramsgate and Dover to one side for the moment.

And Siemens no doubt a front-runner for HS2 instigated by the David Cameron regime with the London Underground and Crossrail (One and Two) tweaks that are Europe's largest construction projects.

And vital for the HS1 rail connectivity here in Kent (Siemens previously active with Vattenfall here in Ramsgate for the London Array the largest wind farm in the world) with Hitachi and Eurostar - the new Amsterdam rail route open this month.

That London-Amsterdam inital route a concern in return journey delays merely due to a lack of carriages. While East Kent could easily benefit from NHS coordination with the new and empty Calais hospital (some of those 10,000 early deaths might have been prevented with a bit of French healthcare) and commuter routes to Northern France and Benelux.

Siemens (Davos#1) no doubt would balk at doing everything - but with shades of the Six Companies - there is surely no obstacle that the Trump Davos 15 Friends can't overcome together whether by formal or informal joint ventures?

Nestle (Davos#2) and Adidas (Davos#3) might well focus more on sponsorships, whether the Morocco 2026 bid, or the new David Beckham Miami soccer team. Surely a hole in one there for POTUS Trump's Florida winter home in deepening UK links and developing a rundown area of Miami?

Victoria Beckham's fashion work and USA expansion, surely a UK strategic interest as part of its fashion portfolio. Adidas a fashion brand as much as a sports brand.

While Nestle increases in chocolate raisins or peanuts would not just fuel a soccer or NFL game but also the West African cocoa and North Carolina peanut economies. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina active on this month's USA trade mission to UK and a keen advocate of peanuts the official state snack.

As an aside, the boom in healthy eating and anti-obesity work from Yale reports on the benefits of legumes and tree nuts surely not reflected yet in market growth and reduced prices. Walmart Asda urging supplies of tree nuts surely a boon for farmers in sunset industries such as tobacco.

Cote D'Ivoire a Nestle and FairTrade strategic interest as much as Nestle is a Cote D'Ivoire strategic interest. Those ports and railheads at Dakar and Nouakchott again for the supermarkets and consumers of Europe and USA.

But if POTUS Trump is active in the rust belt industries and towns of West Virginia and Detroit, American trade tariffs such as steel, are a blunt weapon to boost the American economy.

New investment already in Motor City by Ford surely can't be hindered by Volvo growth (Davos #4), the 2018 car of the year in the XC40 SUV, and with my Sincerity Advertising hat on some rather excellent advertising. Much as Ford in UK is boosting Dagenham and Barking with the new 3 litre engine - an Essex Engine to rival the Midlands Engine given the OBOR links into Margaret Hodge MP's constituency?

Beyond the spark of new factories and AI and Robotics relevant to both Siemens and ABB (Davos #5), perhaps the most vital part of the transport industry is the supply chain of spare parts and logistics connections. Howell in Michigan an outpost of the Thai Summit Group, also active in India, and one of the founders of the new Future Forward political party in Thailand as that nation returns to full democracy guided by Uncle Tu's FDR fireside chats.

Auto parts as crucial to Thailand (and UK and USA) as is Tourism. Those 2030 World Cups and Olympics again. Along with the Just In Time supply chain management crucial to global business that Brexit is foundering upon. And certainly DHL Thailand no doubt learning lessons in how not to do it from DHL UK and the KFC fiasco of chicken shops without chicken - a variant on a pub without beer or coffee shop without coffee. The latter a concern for Nestle brands beyond just Nescafe.

The good folks of Bidvest Logistics plucking KFC from further disaster in taking back the KFC contract - let's hope they charge double.

And if logistics oils the wheels of industry then so does oil, for the moment, with Statoil (Davos #6) rebranding as Equinor to postion itself much as BP has gone Beyond Petroleum for a renewables world. And Morocco and Gibraltar railways and bridges aside, both Algeria and post-conflict Libya must be a shoo-in for solar panel growth.

Even refloating the Desertec mega-project alongside Prince MBS's Neom City-State that if not necessarily making the desert bloom would power all of Europe and Africa and Arabia.

As an aside, Equinor celebrated as something of a rebranding success in the Daily Telegraph last week, compared to Phillips, a great Dutch brand in electronics and healthcare now rebranding as Signify for its lighting division. Huh? Why? That's a lot of advertising money to rework that brand.

And a delay in casting light on the DNA Bathroom Mirror?

With the isolation of the P53 gene at the root of many of the 200 cancers the DNA Bathroom Mirror becomes a household doctor - and no doubt as ubiquitous in every house as an electronic toothbrush or front door. One for Siemens again - or perhaps Panasonic?

Surely it wouldn't be so outrageous to have a Japanese adjunct to the European and American flavour of the Trump Davos 15 Friends? Whether the Meiji Kent thrust of the afore-mentioned Hitachi in Kent, or Panasonic or Toshiba in Thailand or Mitsubishi. Nissan and Toyota and Honda already key ingredients of the UK Northern Powerhouse with the Sunderland factoryone of the largest manufacturing sites in Europe.

France's Total Oil (Davos #7) may have some way to go beyond the US Conference of Mayors or National Association of Governors to overcome the USA war crimes listing for its Myanmar pipelines and switching to solar.

(To be continued - from Davos#7 to #15)

Time for Change
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