A year of hard work comes to an end

It is important to admit that as information generators and consumers, we carry great responsibility, since the only way to end uncertainty and speculation, which do such harm to business activities and to society in general, is by assuming a responsible attitude in two ways: providing truthful information and demanding truthfulness from institutions which generate primary sources.

"Good intentions alone, pave the road to hell", says a popular Spanish proverb, and it seems like the recent decision of the Government to reduce raw materials and capital goods tariffs form 5 % to 1% will not improve economic efficiency, but increase protectionism between sectors, according to Carmen Urizar's, who writes this month's Point of View column.

Other sources of distortion and conflict are the procedures used for obtaining concessions in Guatemala. In our Law and Business section, legislation regarding contracts granted by the Government seem to create the proper environment for corruption, enabling the contractor to be judge and defendant at the same time.

On their 63rd Anniversary, Agencias Way has a success story to share with us. This appliance store managed by the Way family, demonstrates how a great future is possible for family businesses. Not less important is the story of VEPASA, a company which, in the middle of a crisis, developed an extraordinary corporate strategy to distribute consumer goods.

Common sense continues to be the basic ingredient of a success assuring formula for every activity. Business must not be an exception. Three national enterprises give proof of it when adventuring into practice of TQM or reengineering.

Although in some cases business success is equivalent to family failure, without a magic recipe to avoid it, the Mexican consultant Jorge Zuloaga admits that some attitudes exist, that we all can adopt in order to reach the so much desired balance.

The World Wide Web makes it possible for millions of people to communicate through their computers and exchange from cooking recipes and pictures of their pets, to results of scientific research. In Guatemala we already have access to the Web, the most popular Internet service.

Once again a Latin American country makes a step forward towards development. Although maintaining an international image spotted by drug dealing, security and safety problems and the lack of justice, Colombia has maintained the best growth rate record of the region for the last 25 years.