Industry’s surprising success

If Lebanese industrialists are seeking a quantum of solace, it is that those around them are in a worse position. From tourism, to retail, to construction, many of Lebanon’s businessmen are more in the mire than industrialists. As Jacques Sarraf, chairman of Malia Group and former head of the Association of Lebanese Industrialists, put it to Executive, “if we look at different sectors within the environment of Lebanon, industry is still on the safe side.” If 2012 was a year of shock, 2013 has partly been one of readjustment, with confidence slightly up. The industrial sector’s balance of opinions, a measure of the difference between the proportion of managers who consider that there was an improvement in the industry and those who feel it has declined, was at -8 in the first quarter of the year, static from the previous quarter but up from -24 during the same quarter of