Bad times coming ahead

The world was shaken by the credit crunch in the US, which created a tidal wave of repercussions to other industries and economies all over the world. I don’t usually follow up with current economic news, but this caught my attention. The industry that I am in definitely greatly affected.

The Petrochemical industry is downstream in nature and most of our products goes to auto makers and the construction industry. Needless to say with the credit crunch, construction works has been put on hold, auto manufacturers are cutting back on production, if not shutting down. Orders for parts and materials consequently slows down or stop, causing low demand for our products. As a result, Petchem plants all over the world are also cutting down production if not shutting down. Prices as a result are crashing to historical lows.

Jobs are cut all over the world, across various industries, there are just too many to list down. Countries are going into technical recessions, in definition, a technical recession is when the growth of a country contracts for two consecutive quarters.

I have toyed on the idea of resigning and looking for a job outside my comfort zone. But at a time like this, it is of course not a very good idea. In light of what is to come, I think we need to brace ourselves for the worst. 2009 will be a more challenging year. Our first instinct would be to cut back and save for stormy days ahead. However, countries such as Australia is providing a stimulus package amounting to USD 25 million to its citizens to spend to stimulate the economy and prevent it from going into recession. Malaysian government has asked us to do the same, but the funds unfortunately has to come out of our own pockets! They have cut back 3% of the EPF deductions to enable us to have more take home pay. But like I said, we might want to save that money for rainy (or perhaps stormy?) day!

On my part, I definitely need to cut back. How? I am not sure, I don’t spend that much anyway. We do spend far too much eating out. Maybe I should cook more at home. Or I could still keep eating out so can contribute to “spending” to save restaurants from losing business hehe….