The speakers were: Piotr Bielski (director of the economic analysis department, Santander Bank Polska), Dr. Sonia Buchholtz (director of energy transition financing program, Energy Forum), Ludwik Kotecki (member of Monetary Policy Council), Dr. Aleksander Łaszek (manager in the Deloitte economic analysis team, member of the Society of Polish Economists), Prof. Witold Orłowski (Vistula Academy/Warsaw University of Technology, Program Council of the International Institute of Civil Society), and  Andrzej Rzońca Ph.D (professor of the College of Economic Analysis, Warsaw School of Economics).

Economic Espresso is a project that provides a platform for a lively, substantive discussion and exchange of experiences and insights into the current condition of the Polish economy and the most important socio-economic events.

In the third episode, experts discussed, among other things, Polish entrepreneurs’ prospects in 2022, rampant inflation, and the impact of the Polish Order on the economy.

- My impression is that we are heading towards a crisis mood. Currently, economic growth does not look bad, but its future prospects - alreadybad. Similarly, the prospects for pandemics are worrying. We also have a huge inflation problem, which could result in something really serious,” Prof. Witold Orłowski said.

- It would be good for us to bear the costs of increased inflation as shortly  as possible, and the costs of just bringing inflation down to a low level and restoring price stability were as low as possible. The election of a new Monetary Policy Council creates opportunities to rebuild credibility of the National Bank of Poland,” Andrzej Rzonca, PhD, noted.

- Some of the challenges we can see now are not new at all. Already in 2019 i 2020 we saw the first signs of that what is happening now with inflation and the labor market. Of course, then the pandemic covered those problems and more important challenges emerged. However, it is not surprising that the number of working people is slowly shrinking,”  Dr. Aleksander Łaszek added.

- This year will be generally good for the financial sector.  A higher interest rate environment clearly favors the banking sector and interest income. However, the question arises as to how it will ultimately affect the quality of the loan portfolio. This will depend certainly on the scale of interest rate increases. If it stops around 3-4 percent, it seems that this is not a level that would be a threat - Piotr Bielski admitted.

- The two policies [monetary and fiscal] should not be in conflict with each other. On the one hand, for four months we have been seeing that the monetary policy is getting to tighten. On the other hand, everything indicates that the fiscal policy is to become looser this year than in 2021. These actions are going in two different directions, but they should be in tune  - Ludwik Kotecki noted.

- We are facing a socio-economic challenge. For many years we have been deferring decisions needed to be made, even though they may be politically difficult.  The fact that we depend on fossil fuels and have outdated infrastructure is in favor of the transition. On the other hand, there are incentives to switch to low-carbon energy sources - Dr. Sonia Buchholtz said.

The debate was moderated by Łukasz Korycki, deputy editor-in-chief of Puls Biznesu.