Vicente Lafuente is one of the most recognized faces of the business community in the province of Valencia as president of Femeval, the Metal Federation which is also the largest sectoral employer association by representativeness by bringing together more than 3,200 companies through its associations in very different fields.
What is the impact that DANA has had?
The situation right now is absolutely dramatic. The catastrophe has affected an entire region, which is also very active industrially, with many services and a large population. The impact at the moment can be said to be practically 100% in the companies in the region. And the effects are going to spread because there are companies that, although they are not in it, have the majority of their clients in that region.
And can Valencian companies that are not in that area today work?
In small Valencian companies today we have problems because we have people who live in the most affected areas. We have to be supportive of them and understand that they have to be where they need it. There are many things that are going to be paralyzed and slowed down and we are aware.
What do they ask of the Administration to recover some normality?
The first thing is to recover the victims and find the missing people. The second thing will be to put all the means and get ourselves structured and structured to take advantage of our strengths and add, not going like headless chickens each on their own. For recovery, the more structured and coordinated we all go, the faster it will be. And we all know that political anger does not help society.
What do you consider to be the most urgent measures?
You cannot take away their jobs and salaries from people who have lost everything. We need a guarantee from the Government that these salaries will be able to be maintained provisionally, that it will be easy for companies to benefit from ERTEs, not with the administrative complexity that existed until now. We need there to be sufficient funds to recover the companies’ facilities. This also requires a lot of investment in infrastructure.
Can you estimate the time it will take to return to normal and achieve recovery?
Talking about deadlines is free. With money and coordination everything can be done faster, but now we have to work 1000 percent to recover people. And then if in one year we have recovered some activity, and in three or four years we have managed to return to the current level, we will have done something right.
That supposes a long-term horizon to be able to get out of this crisis.
Right now the situation that we know we are going to experience in the daily lives of companies is one of total uncertainty. We don’t know if clients are going to be able to pay us or not, or if we are going to have work or not. Those of us who have experience already know where the problems are going to come from.
How are Femeval and the sector collaborating in the face of this humanitarian crisis?
From the companies and Femeval we have two fundamental lines. The first, which continues to be the priority, consists of searching for the missing people and working to clean up the mess to try to return to activity. All the associations of electricity, gas and water installers working hard in the mud at street level, directly with the municipalities and with the operators to reach where they cannot. The second happens because we already have to start thinking about the day after. We are talking with the Administration to see how to generate mobility for workers and also so that people in this region who have lost their vehicles, of which there are thousands, can access to buy a vehicle.
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