WEBVTT - Is Economic Self-Sufficiency a Myth? 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:08.680 Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. What I would point 0:00:08.680 --> 0:00:11.159 out to people who take the view that globalization has 0:00:11.160 --> 0:00:15.680 gone too far is that you'll miss it when it's gone. 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:19.320 We can't roll up those supply chains and cut ourselves 0:00:19.360 --> 0:00:22.560 off from other countries about dramatically changing the way we live. 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:35.080 I'm Stephanie Flanders, head of Government and Economics at Bloomberg 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:37.920 and This is Trump Pnomics, the podcast that looks at 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:40.840 the economic world of Donald Trump, how he's already shaped 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:43.800 the global economy. What on earth is going to happen 0:00:43.880 --> 0:00:48.120 next this week? Why you'd miss globalization if it went 0:00:48.640 --> 0:00:51.400 Probably a lot more than you think. There's been a 0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:53.720 lot of books written in the last few years about globalization, 0:00:53.880 --> 0:00:58.600 deglobalization and the populist threats to integration. But one that's 0:00:58.640 --> 0:01:02.680 a bit different is Ben Choose Exile Economics. What happens 0:01:02.720 --> 0:01:07.440 if globalization fails. Ben is the policy and analyst correspondent 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:11.760 at BBC Verify and was previously economics editor of BBC Newsnight, 0:01:12.040 --> 0:01:15.199 a job I used to have million years ago. What's 0:01:15.240 --> 0:01:19.240 distinctive in Ben's approach is he's taking the arguments against integration. 0:01:19.520 --> 0:01:23.560 You might say both seriously and literally he's asking not 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:27.800 just whether it's desirable for nations to shun globalization to 0:01:27.920 --> 0:01:32.319 be self sufficient, whether it's even possible. I sat down 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:34.959 with him in late June at an event organized by 0:01:35.040 --> 0:01:38.880 The Conduit in London to discuss his reporting, his style 0:01:38.920 --> 0:01:42.200 of storytelling, and how his own family history played a 0:01:42.240 --> 0:01:44.600 part in the development of the book. I thought it 0:01:44.640 --> 0:01:47.720 was worth sharing with you an edited version of that conversation. 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:51.320 I started by asking Ben why he decided to write 0:01:51.360 --> 0:01:55.520 the book. 0:01:57.560 --> 0:01:59.800 On that question, I feel incredibly honored to have had 0:01:59.840 --> 0:02:03.320 a sort of front row seat to see the impact 0:02:03.400 --> 0:02:06.200 of globalization firsthand. And of course what does that mean. 0:02:06.200 --> 0:02:09.400 We've all seen globalization in our lives. But because my 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:12.800 family came from China, my father's family came from China 0:02:12.960 --> 0:02:15.600 in the in nineteen sixty he came over to the UK. 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:18.320 I was born here, but he's still got family back 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:21.240 in China, and I first visited. I write about this 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:23.239 in the book, but I first visited China in nineteen 0:02:23.280 --> 0:02:25.840 eighty five. When I went there, I was a quite 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:29.920 young child, and I still remember it incredibly vividly, the 0:02:30.040 --> 0:02:34.600 lives they were living those forty odd years ago, and 0:02:34.880 --> 0:02:38.880 it was incredibly uh frugal. Really, you know, in family 0:02:38.919 --> 0:02:41.560 of six lived in about three rooms. They would pull 0:02:41.600 --> 0:02:44.400 out mattresses from under the beds and all sleep on 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:46.280 the floor, just simply because that's the only way they 0:02:46.280 --> 0:02:49.760 could live. They didn't have things like washing machines, microwaves. 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:51.400 We were living in Hong Kong at the time, so 0:02:52.000 --> 0:02:54.160 they asked us to sort of go to this special 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:57.160 friendship store, which is the only place where you could 0:02:57.200 --> 0:03:00.200 get western white goods, and you had to be a 0:03:00.240 --> 0:03:02.440 foreigner to buy them, might from not from China. And 0:03:02.440 --> 0:03:04.960 then we bought it and then get gifted it to them. 0:03:04.960 --> 0:03:06.600 And it's crazy now because you think, how out have 0:03:06.639 --> 0:03:07.880 you ever been to ch I'm sure a lot of 0:03:07.919 --> 0:03:10.560 you being just like how CONSUMERISTI all is. You can 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:14.320 get anything there that you can get here, iPhone's laptops, 0:03:14.320 --> 0:03:19.919 certainly washing machines. So to see first hand how their 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:23.519 lives have changed in my lifetime, and I think it 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:27.239 is very largely due to globalization. So I suppose the 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:28.760 question is why did I want to write this book? 0:03:28.960 --> 0:03:31.359 Because I think that I could bring something a sort 0:03:31.360 --> 0:03:33.640 of bit of personal experience, if you like, to seeing 0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:38.680 how the good that globalization has done to my own family, 0:03:38.880 --> 0:03:42.040 and to see it very vividly in a personal way 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:44.880 really brings it home. And when we hear people like 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:49.880 Robert Leitheiser, who is Donald Trump's first trade advisor in 0:03:49.920 --> 0:03:52.680 his first term, he wrote this book that says it 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:55.320 with the title No Trade is Free, and he very 0:03:55.320 --> 0:03:58.360 explicitly states that it was a mistake to trade with 0:03:58.640 --> 0:04:03.360 China or allow China specifically into the World Trade Organization 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:05.840 in two thousand and one. It was a mistake. And 0:04:05.880 --> 0:04:08.760 I just kind of like incredibly jarring, because what comes 0:04:08.760 --> 0:04:10.400 into my mind when I hear that is my own 0:04:10.400 --> 0:04:13.920 family backing Gangdhou in southern China. Well, really wasn't a 0:04:13.960 --> 0:04:16.760 mistake for them. And now we can talk about the 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:21.080 ways which China does create very serious problems for the 0:04:21.120 --> 0:04:24.240 world trading system in many many ways. But I think 0:04:24.279 --> 0:04:27.520 on a very personal and human level, I think I 0:04:27.600 --> 0:04:29.640 really wanted to tell that the other side of the 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:33.200 story actually and bring that personal experience to bear. 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:35.960 I think, and of course I find that criticism about 0:04:35.960 --> 0:04:38.640 the Entry's wto jarring for a whole other reason because 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:40.840 when I was at the US Treasury, we were just 0:04:40.880 --> 0:04:46.000 negotiating the China entry to the WTO, and since then 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:49.720 almost everyone thinks that that was a mistake, including many 0:04:49.760 --> 0:04:52.039 of the people who were involved in negotiating it, because 0:04:52.120 --> 0:04:54.320 various assumptions were made about what was going to happen 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:56.680 to China after that, that they would basically become more 0:04:56.760 --> 0:05:00.160 like us and sort of market driven, that being part 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:03.480 of the global economy would push them on this same 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:06.400 path that we've all been on, and that clearly has 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:10.280 not happened, And you engage very directly with that in 0:05:10.320 --> 0:05:14.560 the book. We should part that briefly, but I guess 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:17.400 we should also slightly lay out your stall in terms of, 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:20.560 you know, what's the architecture of the book? How did 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:24.160 you decide that there are real things that people are 0:05:24.200 --> 0:05:28.200 responding to when they're nervous of globalization? 0:05:28.560 --> 0:05:32.240 Yeah? Absolutely so. The gestination of this book was really 0:05:32.720 --> 0:05:36.200 in the pandemic, when the question that was arising in 0:05:36.240 --> 0:05:39.440 lots of people's minds was, hang on, has globalization gone 0:05:39.440 --> 0:05:41.880 a bit too far? Are we a bit too interconnected? 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:45.359 Has it made us vulnerable where we thought it was 0:05:45.400 --> 0:05:49.080 making us more prosperous. We all remember in the pandemic 0:05:49.880 --> 0:05:53.880 the shortages of things like masks, medicines, and hard on 0:05:53.920 --> 0:05:56.239 the heels of that, of course, we had Russia's invasion 0:05:56.279 --> 0:05:58.760 of Ukraine in twenty twenty two, where there was a 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:02.560 big shock to global oil prices and food prices, and 0:06:02.880 --> 0:06:05.200 there was a real sense that we were a bit 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:08.719 too exposed and maybe we should start to do produce 0:06:08.839 --> 0:06:11.640 more at home, that those supply chains shouldn't be as 0:06:11.640 --> 0:06:15.080 extensive as they are, and that maybe, as I said, 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:17.960 globalization had gone a bit too far. I really started 0:06:18.160 --> 0:06:20.120 the idea of writing this and it came out of it. 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:22.520 Actually a BBC radio series I did called The New 0:06:22.560 --> 0:06:25.520 Age of Autarchy with a question actually rather than an answer, 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:28.440 and that question was is it possible to actually do 0:06:28.480 --> 0:06:31.680 those things to be more self sufficient in terms of 0:06:31.720 --> 0:06:36.120 things like food and energy and medicine, you name it. 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:39.120 It was a good faith exploration of whether it was 0:06:39.200 --> 0:06:41.520 possible or not. And as I started to write it, 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:45.360 explore these supply chains in more detail and go into 0:06:45.720 --> 0:06:50.920 some of the complexities of the way the global value 0:06:50.920 --> 0:06:53.520 and supply chains have constructed, it became more and more 0:06:53.560 --> 0:06:55.960 clear to me that actually the answer probably is no. 0:06:56.600 --> 0:07:00.840 At least we can't roll up those supplies chain and 0:07:00.960 --> 0:07:04.159 cut ourselves off from other countries about dramatically changing the 0:07:04.160 --> 0:07:06.760 way we live. And I think on some level we 0:07:06.880 --> 0:07:09.680 all know that, don't we, Because you know globalization if 0:07:09.720 --> 0:07:12.080 you think, well, just look around you. We wake up 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:14.640 in the morning and you brush your teeth and toothpastes 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:16.480 from Poland, and you go and have your breakfast and 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:19.000 the grapes from Egypt, and then you put on your 0:07:19.000 --> 0:07:21.560 clothes and it was perhaps it sticks together in Bangladesh, 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:24.560 and then you drive your German made car to the office. 0:07:24.800 --> 0:07:28.640 That's the typical way someone describes how globalization shapes our lives, 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:31.280 and it's all true. But what I discovered in this 0:07:31.560 --> 0:07:34.120 researching this book and lots of other people that made 0:07:34.120 --> 0:07:36.240 this point as well, And it's not just about those 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:41.240 consumer goods which are the fruits of globalization. It's the 0:07:41.320 --> 0:07:46.920 components which make those consumer goods which are unfathomably globalized 0:07:46.960 --> 0:07:50.800 as well. Just talking about semiconductors, you know, we hear 0:07:50.800 --> 0:07:55.239 about those and we took Trump and others and Biden 0:07:55.320 --> 0:07:58.200 all wanted to make them in America rather than import them. 0:07:58.720 --> 0:08:01.680 But if you look at the supply for something like semiconductors, 0:08:01.680 --> 0:08:07.760 they're so unfathomably complex, coming from hundreds of different countries, 0:08:07.800 --> 0:08:11.040 these raw materials and the machines that make them that 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:14.720 it really is impossible to see any single country having 0:08:14.720 --> 0:08:20.520 a fully nationalized supply chain in something like semiconductors, computer chips, 0:08:20.880 --> 0:08:23.400 and it goes for many other things as well, and 0:08:23.440 --> 0:08:26.040 I talk about lots of examples of these in the book. 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:28.440 So Yes. I started out I guess with a question, 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:32.240 and I came increasingly to an answer, which is that, 0:08:32.679 --> 0:08:36.040 you know, don't take globalization for granted, or don't assume 0:08:36.080 --> 0:08:39.200 that it's going to be simple or easy, which is 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:43.439 obviously what a lot of the exile economic exponents populist 0:08:43.480 --> 0:08:45.400 politicians say it's going to be quite easy to do 0:08:45.440 --> 0:08:47.640 these things. It really won't be. It'd be very expensive. 0:08:48.400 --> 0:08:50.839 And you know, I'm a BBC journalist. It's not my 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:53.360 job to say what people should want or what politicians 0:08:53.360 --> 0:08:55.760 should do. What I'm trying to do in this book 0:08:55.840 --> 0:08:58.280 is say, be aware of the costs, be aware of 0:08:58.280 --> 0:09:02.479 the implication it's impossible. Well, you know, if people genuinely 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:06.800 think that it's worth it, then that's fine, but I 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:09.559 would like them to do it with the full facts. 0:09:09.600 --> 0:09:10.080 In mine. 0:09:10.440 --> 0:09:14.199 You mentioned semi conductors. I think with electronics generally people 0:09:14.240 --> 0:09:17.840 will sort of understand that it's a pretty complicated supply chain, 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:19.840 and in fact, that is what we're discovering. You know, 0:09:19.880 --> 0:09:24.480 with the tariffs. Donald Trump sort of outraged the thought 0:09:24.520 --> 0:09:28.040 that even with various high tariff rates, Apple's still not 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:30.600 going to want to make iPhones in the US and 0:09:30.880 --> 0:09:33.600 to your point, cannot make iPhones in the US because 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:36.000 there's so many things coming from different parts of the world. 0:09:37.120 --> 0:09:40.560 But food, how hard could it be to be self 0:09:40.559 --> 0:09:41.720 sufficient in food? 0:09:42.120 --> 0:09:45.240 Well, that was one of the most fascinating journeys I've 0:09:45.240 --> 0:09:46.920 been on actually in the book, because that was the 0:09:46.920 --> 0:09:49.160 one where I started out was I think, I'm sure 0:09:49.200 --> 0:09:50.920 many of you will will will have this sense that 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:54.679 do we really need to import so much food from abroad? 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:58.400 You know, the UK provides about or supplies about sixty 0:09:58.400 --> 0:10:01.320 percent of the food that we consume in so, you know, 0:10:02.280 --> 0:10:04.880 pretty reliant on the rest of the world for food. 0:10:05.800 --> 0:10:10.640 And why not, as the farmers say, you know, produce 0:10:10.840 --> 0:10:13.680 more at home, consume more at home. It'd be good 0:10:13.679 --> 0:10:17.200 for good for farmers, good for the economy, and good 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:18.920 for food security. And I think that is quite an 0:10:18.920 --> 0:10:23.160 intuitive argument. It's a very common argument that you hear. 0:10:23.480 --> 0:10:26.000 What I've discovered in the book is that it's really 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:28.160 for a large part of the world, it's just not 0:10:28.280 --> 0:10:30.640 feasible to rely only on the food that can be 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:34.200 grown in that individual country. So there's a striking cistic 0:10:34.240 --> 0:10:38.040 from a study done in twenty twenty which I imagine, 0:10:38.080 --> 0:10:42.840 if everyone on the planet had a one hundred kilometer 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:47.920 circle drawn around them, what proportion of the world's population 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:51.760 could feed themselves from staple foods grown within that one 0:10:51.840 --> 0:10:55.960 hundred kilometer radius. And the answer is it's only twenty 0:10:56.080 --> 0:10:59.160 five percent, So only a quarter of the global population 0:10:59.520 --> 0:11:03.920 could feed themselves within that area. So how big would 0:11:03.920 --> 0:11:06.800 that circle need to be around every single person on 0:11:06.840 --> 0:11:09.520 the planet so that they could feed themselves on staple 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:12.400 foods like wheat and corn and potatoes and what have you. 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:16.439 It would have to be two thousand kilometers. And what 0:11:16.440 --> 0:11:19.280 that tells you is, given the size of countries, given 0:11:19.280 --> 0:11:21.200 the size of the planet, is that if we're going 0:11:21.240 --> 0:11:23.720 to feed ourselves as a world, as a planet, we're 0:11:23.720 --> 0:11:27.080 going to be incredibly reliant on trade in food. This 0:11:27.240 --> 0:11:31.400 idea and food self sufficiency is a non starter for 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:36.720 probably most people on the planet. And that's really sobering thought, 0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:39.280 isn't it, Because we often hear this line, as I said, 0:11:39.360 --> 0:11:41.400 we just do it at home. Just do it at home. Well, 0:11:41.640 --> 0:11:43.200 it's not going to happen. At least we're not going 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:45.560 to have the kind of diets that we used to, 0:11:45.880 --> 0:11:48.720 increasing reliance on meat in large parts of the world, 0:11:49.160 --> 0:11:52.400 the variety of food. But simply we can't feed ourselves 0:11:52.440 --> 0:11:54.960 as a planet with just national production. 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:57.439 Although that fact does cast some light on why Donald 0:11:57.440 --> 0:11:59.280 Trump w with want Canada, because I think the Americans 0:11:59.280 --> 0:12:00.920 will probably do quite well if they could just take 0:12:00.960 --> 0:12:02.280 all of the Canadian planes. 0:12:02.559 --> 0:12:06.319 Well, that was another interesting thing about it, because America, 0:12:06.400 --> 0:12:09.360 on the face of it, is very abundant in food. 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:12.640 It produces more than it consumes. It's a big agricultural 0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:15.480 exporter to the rest of the world in net terms. 0:12:15.600 --> 0:12:20.040 But even America relies on fertilizer imports quite a lot 0:12:20.040 --> 0:12:23.720 of them from Canada. So even if you say America 0:12:23.760 --> 0:12:25.079 doesn't need the rest of the world when it comes 0:12:25.120 --> 0:12:27.439 to food, well, it actually needs chemicals from the rest 0:12:27.440 --> 0:12:30.679 of the world to make its agriculture so productive. 0:12:31.160 --> 0:12:33.160 In your chapter about food, you also you have a 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:35.080 distinction which I think is used for in another areas 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:38.240 as well, because you think of self sufficiency, as we 0:12:38.640 --> 0:12:41.800 often painted politically, as being the same as security. If 0:12:41.840 --> 0:12:45.199 you're making it your own, then you're not at the 0:12:45.200 --> 0:12:50.280 behest of foreign powers and dictators. But you make the point, 0:12:50.360 --> 0:12:54.720 especially with food, that food security is very different from 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:56.600 that and is often just related to poverty. 0:12:56.800 --> 0:13:00.120 Yeah. I had a look at countries ranked by by 0:13:01.160 --> 0:13:05.960 food self sufficiency, so how much of their own consumption 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:08.720 they're producing at home, and also about their levels of 0:13:08.720 --> 0:13:11.240 food security. Is the proportion of the populations who are 0:13:11.360 --> 0:13:15.199 struggling to feed themselves. So just to take two examples 0:13:15.240 --> 0:13:16.560 which I've plucked out in the book, which I think 0:13:16.559 --> 0:13:20.920 are really illustrative, So the Zambia in Africa, which is 0:13:21.240 --> 0:13:26.520 only seven percent reliant on imports according to the measures 0:13:26.520 --> 0:13:28.360 of the which I was looking at, so it basically 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:30.760 produces more or less all that it consumes when it 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:35.640 comes to agriculture, but it has food insecurity levels which 0:13:35.640 --> 0:13:40.160 are extremely high, so more than fifty percent. And if 0:13:40.200 --> 0:13:44.079 you look at a country like Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, 0:13:44.360 --> 0:13:50.200 which has a food self sufficiency ratio which is incredibly low, 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:54.080 so almost the inverse of Zambia, but its food security 0:13:55.160 --> 0:13:57.920 was incredibly high. And what's the difference between those two countries. 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:02.440 Mauritius is a much richer country than Zambia is. So 0:14:03.120 --> 0:14:06.000 precisely as you said, I think the lesson is what 0:14:06.160 --> 0:14:09.959 leads to food insecurity is not reliance on imports. It's 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:13.240 poverty and you need to solve that if you want 0:14:13.280 --> 0:14:18.079 people to be well fed, rather than obsessing about local production. 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:20.440 And actually, and you made the very obvious point which 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:24.440 I hadn't thought about, that you could be completely self sufficient, 0:14:24.600 --> 0:14:27.040 but if you have a crop failure, if you've also 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:29.600 closed yourself off from the world, then you are instantly 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:31.800 less secure just through that factor. 0:14:31.880 --> 0:14:34.080 Lae. Yeah, I mean we all know this in a 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:36.760 way because we all saw the example of Ukraine. Ukraine 0:14:36.800 --> 0:14:39.160 it has this reputation of the bread basket of Europe 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:42.680 going back for decades, and it is it is. On paper, 0:14:42.720 --> 0:14:46.360 it's incredibly food secure, it produces more than it consumes. 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:48.680 It's a big exporter to the rest of the world. 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:52.600 But when it got invaded by Russia in twenty twenty two, 0:14:52.760 --> 0:14:55.360 it had to rely on the World Food Program to 0:14:55.720 --> 0:14:58.880 feed three million of its population. That just shows you 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:01.920 how just have a large amount of agricultural production doesn't 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:03.840 necessarily make you secure. 0:15:04.760 --> 0:15:07.640 So it's fair to say we've not overplanned this conversation. 0:15:07.680 --> 0:15:10.280 But you have taken me perfectly to the subject of 0:15:10.360 --> 0:15:14.160 Ukraine and Russia. Because energy is the other example where 0:15:14.160 --> 0:15:16.560 I think it's the most intuitive to people that we 0:15:16.760 --> 0:15:19.600 just can't depend on other nations for our energy, or 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:21.440 at least it would be much better if we weren't. 0:15:21.960 --> 0:15:24.960 And the celebrated example which you go through, but I 0:15:24.960 --> 0:15:26.400 think a lot of people were have in their heads 0:15:26.520 --> 0:15:30.720 is you know, the way Europe, especially Germany. But Europe 0:15:30.840 --> 0:15:34.480 allowed itself to become very dependent on Russian gas, despite 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:38.760 that the risk of overreliance on Russia being identified by 0:15:38.960 --> 0:15:43.400 Americans and the American intelligence community and others. So what 0:15:43.480 --> 0:15:46.320 about energy. Surely it is better for us to be 0:15:46.440 --> 0:15:48.680 independent in our energy supply, especially now we can get 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:50.560 all of this nice you know wind. 0:15:50.280 --> 0:15:52.040 And so yeah, yeah, well, I mean it takes me 0:15:52.080 --> 0:15:54.280 back again to twenty twenty two when this was what 0:15:54.320 --> 0:15:57.520 the politicians were saying. This, as you said, Stefinitie, it 0:15:57.640 --> 0:16:00.840 shows the folly of relying on energy imports. A country 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:03.360 like Russia can hold you hostage and cut off the 0:16:03.400 --> 0:16:07.120 supply and then you having to have power cuts or rationing. 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:10.080 I found it very compelling that argument in twenty twenty two. 0:16:10.400 --> 0:16:12.720 But when you start as you were paying your gas. 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:15.480 Bill, yeah, absolutely, I'm sure we all felt this, didn't 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:18.920 we And it does tell so perfectly, doesn't it with 0:16:19.040 --> 0:16:22.480 the argument that we should decarbonize and rely on renewables. 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:26.360 And it's all true to some extent. But if you again, 0:16:26.640 --> 0:16:28.840 if you go into the weeds, go into the supply 0:16:29.000 --> 0:16:32.680 chains of all these renewable technologies, you just see how 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:35.960 distributed they are right around the world. Just for example, 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:40.120 the battery that goes into an electric vehicle, the amount 0:16:40.160 --> 0:16:43.960 of critical minerals that it relies on is vastly greater 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:47.320 than a petrol car. And those critical minerals are spread 0:16:47.480 --> 0:16:51.120 right across many, many different countries. There's no single country 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:54.480 can realistically source all those critical minerals at home and 0:16:54.520 --> 0:16:58.160 have a national supply chain. Goes for China, goes to America, 0:16:58.360 --> 0:17:00.960 certainly goes for the UK. And so you just go 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:04.360 through all these renewable technologies and you realize that actually 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:07.120 we are going to be reliant on imports if we're 0:17:07.119 --> 0:17:11.640 going to have a renewable energy generating sector. So that's 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:14.239 not to say that it shouldn't be done. It's to 0:17:14.320 --> 0:17:18.639 say that, actually, be wary of the rhetoric of self 0:17:18.680 --> 0:17:22.080 sufficiency or tarchy when it comes to energy, just as 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:24.879 you should be wary of it when it comes to food, 0:17:25.080 --> 0:17:27.119 or semiconductors or medicines. 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:29.360 If you read the book, we can sort of take 0:17:29.359 --> 0:17:33.800 it as read that he goes through quite a few things, medicine, steel, semiconductors. 0:17:34.240 --> 0:17:37.080 It's really hard, all of them to be self sufficient. 0:17:37.800 --> 0:17:41.480 If Donald Trump was sitting here, he would say, yeah, 0:17:41.600 --> 0:17:44.520 to right, it's really hard because we've had thirty years 0:17:44.520 --> 0:17:46.920 on the wrong path. You know, we took the cheaper option, 0:17:47.119 --> 0:17:49.720 the easier option. We took advantage of like falling to 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:55.040 transportation costs, companies becoming more global, the fact there was 0:17:55.080 --> 0:17:58.520 a sort of broadly peaceful global environment. Countries are all 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:01.159 seemed to be moving in the right direction. So businesses 0:18:01.600 --> 0:18:05.960 created these enormously complicated supply chains that they never should 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:08.200 have done. And yes, it's going to be really painful 0:18:08.200 --> 0:18:10.600 to aren't pick it all. But if we don't, we're 0:18:10.600 --> 0:18:13.040 going to wake up tomorrow and everything we want is 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:14.800 you know, being made by China. 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:17.439 Yeah, well, Donald Trump has changed his tune on this, 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:19.320 hasn't he, Because I'm sure you remember definitely in the 0:18:19.359 --> 0:18:22.719 campaign trail he wasn't talking about the long, difficult journey 0:18:22.760 --> 0:18:25.800 to a more resilient American economy. Now you're right, he 0:18:25.880 --> 0:18:28.120 has started to talk about how this will be hard 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:31.960 and there are other you know, there will be sacrifices 0:18:32.000 --> 0:18:37.360 a long way. But I think how would I try 0:18:37.400 --> 0:18:38.600 and persuade Donald Trump? 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:45.240 Just tim right? The Biden administration in some ways institutionalized 0:18:45.320 --> 0:18:49.399 his kind of gut instinct slash tweets, and he did. 0:18:49.520 --> 0:18:52.639 They did sort of focus more on resilient, focus more 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:54.560 on industrial bis. But it was based on that same 0:18:55.320 --> 0:18:58.840 negation of the original idea of global or what a 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:03.199 driven the previous version of globalization, which is we have 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:06.600 to think about the long term costs our strategic position 0:19:06.680 --> 0:19:09.960 with regard, particularly with regard to China, not just the 0:19:10.040 --> 0:19:11.680 short term cost benefits. 0:19:11.760 --> 0:19:14.199 Yeah. I think Richard Baldwin, I think you've interviewed recently, 0:19:14.240 --> 0:19:19.280 had a great phrase that Trump was not how did 0:19:19.320 --> 0:19:20.920 he put it, He said he wasn't a new turn. 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:23.080 He was a culmination of something that had been going 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:26.560 on for a very long time in politics, this gradual 0:19:26.640 --> 0:19:30.520 sense of, you know, globalization is not working the way 0:19:30.560 --> 0:19:33.840 we thought it, we hoped it would, and we need 0:19:33.840 --> 0:19:37.240 to think more about pulling inwards and turning inwards and 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:41.359 doing things differently. Because you're absolutely right, Joe Biden had 0:19:42.359 --> 0:19:45.040 a lot of those same instincts as well. His administration 0:19:45.119 --> 0:19:47.719 had a lot of the same instincts, and they were 0:19:47.800 --> 0:19:51.399 quite protectionists when it comes to things like Chinese electric vehicles, 0:19:51.560 --> 0:19:57.680 Chinese batteries, and you know, really took on what Trump 0:19:57.720 --> 0:19:59.399 had done in his first term and took it to 0:19:59.440 --> 0:20:01.680 a whole new level. And when it comes to when 0:20:01.680 --> 0:20:04.440 it came to making it harder for China to source 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:08.520 the most advanced microchips, they were much more proactive than 0:20:09.200 --> 0:20:11.879 the Donald Trump had been. So I think that's really 0:20:11.880 --> 0:20:14.320 important to recognize that this isn't something that just don't 0:20:14.440 --> 0:20:17.679 just started when Trump came to the White House. What 0:20:17.720 --> 0:20:19.840 I would point out to people who were not Trumpian 0:20:19.920 --> 0:20:23.000 but sort of take the view that globalization has gone 0:20:23.040 --> 0:20:28.080 too far is that you'll miss it when it's gone. 0:20:28.119 --> 0:20:30.800 I think it's probably the right way to frame it 0:20:30.880 --> 0:20:33.280 because we have taken it for granted that some of 0:20:33.320 --> 0:20:35.760 the huge benefits, not just in terms of like my 0:20:35.840 --> 0:20:41.000 family in China, but all our lives have been enhanced 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:44.560 and we've been made much more productive and wealthier as 0:20:44.600 --> 0:20:50.159 a result of globalization over these past fifty years. In 0:20:50.200 --> 0:20:53.800 a sense, trade is being used as a scapegoat for 0:20:53.840 --> 0:20:58.600 the failures of domestic politics to redistribute those gains and 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:01.919 to compensate the low from it. So I would say, 0:21:02.240 --> 0:21:05.120 I suppose if Trump was here saying, you know, there 0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:10.400 are undoubtedly problems in America, economic problems, communities which are suffering, 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:13.720 but don't make the story all about trade. Make it 0:21:13.800 --> 0:21:18.920 about how you can use the immense resources of America 0:21:19.040 --> 0:21:22.280 to improve their lives. It's quite interesting. I was listening 0:21:22.320 --> 0:21:26.840 to JD. Vans, who's slightly more sophisticated figger than Trump 0:21:26.840 --> 0:21:30.040 when it comes to making these arguments. And he gave 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:33.040 a speech in March to the American Dynamism Conference, and 0:21:33.080 --> 0:21:37.320 he said the problem of the American and global economies 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:41.000 that has been too addicted to cheap labor, both at 0:21:41.000 --> 0:21:46.479 home and talking about immigration and abroad, meaning outsourcing American 0:21:46.560 --> 0:21:50.000 multinationals sending their supply chain to broad cheap labor. And 0:21:50.040 --> 0:21:54.560 he said that as undermined American innovation, which is pretty 0:21:54.560 --> 0:21:57.720 crazy because America is the most innovative and dynamic economy 0:21:57.920 --> 0:21:59.920 by far in the world. If it's had a net 0:22:00.000 --> 0:22:02.440 negative impact on American innovation, it's pretty hard to see 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:03.560 it in the statistics. 0:22:04.080 --> 0:22:06.480 But well, you mentioned Jadevance. I mean, I think it's 0:22:06.520 --> 0:22:08.919