Uprisings in the region, financial tumult on the global markets and the ever-capricious dramas on the domestic political rostrum have not made life easy for Lebanon’s industrialists in 2011. Yet the sector has doggedly managed to hold ground on its shaky shores. Just. In the first eight months of the year, industrial exports — a good indicator of the sector’s competitive performance — were up 7.4 percent on the same period in 2010. If not quite cause to crack open the champagne, the figures may at least elicit a sigh of relief from Lebanon’s industrialists. Keen to tout the successes of his sector, Minister of Industry Vrej Sabounjian struck an upbeat note in November, glowing over the fact that 206 industrial licenses were issued in the first half of the year. However, a closer inspection of the figures blurs this rose-tinted depiction of the industrial landscape in Lebanon. Only 41
