Estonia

Estonia July CPI up 4.5 pct

According to FXStreet.com, "The price of goods and services in Estonia were up an average of 4.5 pct in July on a year earlier, BNS newswire reported citing the country's Statistical Office."

"The hike in administratively-regulated prices of goods and services was by 5.7 pct and in non-regulated prices by 4.1 pct. Compared with June, the consumer price index was 0.5 pct higher. Compared with the prior month, the index was affected the most by a rise in the price of motor fuel, housing, vegetables as well as discounts in clothing and footware." 

Unless the average inflation rate in the EU rises to at least 3% in 2007 it looks like Estonia may be shut out of the Euro again in 2008 due to Maastricht Treaty requirements, unless Estonia's economy cools during the same period. 

Cabinet rejects naming SS "Freedom Fighters"

Tallinn (Interfax) - The Estonian Cabinet on Thursday rejected an opposition proposal to designate Estonians who fought for the Nazis, together with the members of the Forest Brotherhood, as "fighters for the liberation of Estonia".

Meri Remembered

Lennart Meri, who died at the age of 76 on March 14, 2006, will be missed.  Meri was Estonia's first post-soviet president and was a key figure in leading its charge to independence after he and his family returned from exile in Siberia.  A charismatic leader, Meri will be remembered for his unyielding optimism and his strong intellect. 

Meri spoke six languages fluently including English, authored books and wrote films.  As a child, he used to transcribe whole radio broadcasts of Churchill speeches and lectures about the expanding universe from his homemade shortwave radio.

A pragmatic visionary, Meri often carried a screw driver around with him in the presidential palace so he could mend broken coffee makers and light fixtures.  Likewise, before he was president, he believed that Estonia was fixable and foretold that one day it would free itself from Soviet rule.  "In this sense, you could say that, in our family, there was never an Iron Curtain," he said. "The state of mind in my own family was that the existence of a totalitarian state was something very temporary." 

Today, Estonia is light years from its broken past.  As of Meri's death, the small nation of just 1.4mm people is the leading economic light of Europe having  posted the second highest GDP in the Union of more than 10% during 2005.  Estonia ranks 7th on the Heritage Foundation's Economic Freedom Index (ahead of the US - Download wsj_article_jan0406.doc), and is considered to be the most wired nation on earth.   

MICHAEL TARM, Associated Press Writer, has more...>> 

Letter from Tallinn

A recently published article in the Economist clearly illustrates the buzz about Estonia in "Letter from Tallinn".

"Ultra-modernity is not what springs to mind when you first see the Tallinn skyline. A chocolate-box vista of medieval red-tiled roofs, studded with soaring church spires and marinated in seven centuries of history, the Estonian capital looks more like a miniature theme-park than a vision of the future."  More...>>

"Discovering" Estonia

Just warming up here... I thought I would start a blog on something that has captivated my interest and held it for longer than a few months: Estonia -- a tiny country south of Finland with a population of just 1.4 mm people.  The  ELCA has a nice background bit about Estonia (tho I make no endorsements about the ELCA since I'm not religious).  See also CIA World Factbook.

         

I first travelled to Estonia in September 2004 while on a consulting gig through the UCLA Anderson School's Global Access Program.  My colleagues and I were hired to help a Finnish company, GoodMood, develop a US market entry strategy.  GoodMood officials in Helsinki recommended a weekend jaunt to Tallinn, Estonia's capital.  We flew there via an 18 minute helicopter ride and immediately took to its medieval charm and bustling nightlife.  This place smokes!

Since then, I have returned twice, in September 2005 for a realestate conference in Vilnius, Lithuania, and again in December 2005 to purchase my first apartment.  I am scheduled to travel to Tallinn in April 2006 for three weeks, and again in June, and perhaps again in the Fall.