A long one teamInterview with **riel Álvarez, president of the...

A long one team

Interview with **riel Álvarez, president of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Cáceres

The lithium chain could change Cáceres' economic model"

The president of the Chamber of Commerce affirms that "never" in the history of the province have there been so many projects on the table. Some are "truly transformative" because they can generate a good number of "auxiliary industries" around them.

You can't wait any longer. Cáceres must react if he wants to reverse his declining population trend and erase his 'land of emigration' mark. Other territories have resumed growth after the pandemic and do not expect it. This time the province has a "historic opportunity" that it had never enjoyed: several major projects are knocking on its doors with employment under its arm. Employment, the real key to boosting this province. This is stated by **riel Álvarez, president of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Cáceres, a body that has been able to bring together all the sectoral and multisectoral associations of the province since January. It talks about a unique moment that you have to know how to take advantage of.Never in the history of our province have there been so many possible projects on the table at the same time: the gigafactory and the cardboard factory in Navalmoral, the semiconductor factory in Trujillo, the industrial projects linked to the lithium mines of Cañaveral and Cáceres (Valdeflores), the CCGreen polygon also in the capital, expansions of existing industries, etc. If they materialize, as we wish, they could lead to the beginning of a change of model in our economy, moving to a much more industrial one. Some of them are truly transformers because they can generate at the same time a good number of auxiliary industries around, or in the case of lithium, the creation of an industrial pole of development around the value chain of lithium and the electric vehicle.Indeed, this must be the legislature of industrialization. There are opportunities that we have never had in the past.

Where should that industrialization of the province go?

Extremadura, and our province in particular, must take advantage of its natural resources, an advanced and modern livestock and agricultural sector that has led to a strong, innovative and internationalized agri-food industry. Let's continue to strengthen it so that all the products we generate are transformed here. We also have many hours of sun, water, the ability to produce renewable energy, the energy that industries are now looking for: clean, cheap and with a stable price over time.That's why those projects come to Navalmoral and Trujillo, that's why the CCGreen Eco-Industrial polygon wants to be implanted in Cáceres, everyone comes to take advantage of the sun. And green hydrogen is yet to be developed from renewables, fundamental for many industries. We have to take advantage of the path that opens up to us. So let's work so that more companies of these characteristics are installed. Of course, clearly we have to build more large and modern industrial estates in Cáceres and Plasencia, which lack these infrastructures, because without them they will not be able to be located.

He maintains that lithium doesn't just open a mine or a factory. Lithium generates a chain, which is why you don't oppose...

We are fortunate that in our subsoil there are some of the most important lithium deposits in Europe, a scarce but essential mineral for the future of the electric car. Let's facilitate the opening of the two mining operations and industrial projects linked to them in both Cañaveral and Cáceres. Of course, we demand the highest environmental requirements and guarantees from both projects, but if they comply with them and it is demonstrated transparently, let's not put any more problems. The Cañaveral mine and its associated cathode factory represents an investment of close to 600 million and 800 direct jobs. It is in administrative procedures and will generate a lot of dynamism, that wealth that we need so much. The planned mine in Valdeflores, in Cáceres, together with the lithium treatment plant linked to it, will also create more than 700 direct and almost 1,500 indirect stations. The most important thing is that between both projects an important pole of attraction of auxiliary industries and others related to the value chain of lithium and electric vehicles can be formed, with the ability to generate a significant change in our productive system, in the economic model of our province.

All this in a context that has not been favored so far... There is a lack of dynamism, there is plenty of depopulation.

Undoubtedly, depopulation is the most serious problem that threatens the future of Extremadura, especially in the province of Cáceres. You have to act now and forcefully to reverse it before it's too late. The origin is in the very low birth rate and aging, but above all it is in the lack of opportunities and in the lack of sufficient economic dynamism that can create them, which especially affects our young people, in particular many of the most prepared, who in the face of the scarcity of opportunities for the future leave our land.

Where do we start? How do we start fighting it?

First of all with more and better infrastructures, and a favorable and differentiated tax regime for our province, but with more entrepreneurship, with a larger business fabric, with larger and more industrialized companies. That is why it is so important that all these projects that we have mentioned go ahead and that others that must arrive materialize. In the capital of Cáceres, for example, the field of new technologies is already generating employment, it continues to grow. That is the path we must follow with the new projects.

In fact, there are already positions that ask for staff in that area.

There is indeed a problem of specialized labor in some sectors. So much so that in order to achieve the industrialization we are talking about in this province, we have to seriously work on training, especially dual training, both in the classroom and directly in companies.

Communications are still a handicap...

The chronic deficit in infrastructures that Cáceres and Extremadura have had and have, has made us pay for decades an important price in terms of loss of competitiveness of our productive fabric. Without a substantial improvement in connectivity with the rest of Spain and Europe, no long-term industrial transformation process will materialize.The EX - A1 to the Portuguese border is urgent; the construction of the 90 kilometers of railway track of the Ruta de la Plata between Plasencia and Salamanca, which allows the two railway networks of the Atlantic axis to be connected to the west, for trains mainly freight trains; the Cáceres-Badajoz highway whose execution deadlines are scandalous; or the high speed to Madrid.

Let's talk about the future... But how is the fabric of Cáceres now?

We cannot forget that the 25,000 businesses in the province are the main source of wealth and employment. Therefore, we must take care of them as best as possible, making it as easy as possible for them to carry out their activity, with a much more beneficial taxation, with less restrictive, friendlier and simplified regulations that promote the start-up of new businesses and companies, as well as the lightening of procedures and bureaucratic burdens.