Maybe infrastructure is not always good

We all know about the ghost fleet but the story below is wonderful in its tabloid style.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1212013/Revealed-The-ghost-fleet-recession.html

What is more interesting is the following:

World trade wills shrink, because a lot of it was driven by non economic reasons. Its a bet I am willing to make; a lot of the establishment will not agree but most will agree that trade is not going to recover forever to the levels of the past.

That makes a great hole in the infrastructure to facilitate trade that has been, and continues to be, a hallmark of much far eastern investment. Not just the ports, but also all those 40 lane highways in China will likely go to waste....

Luckily we in India did not listen excessively to the pundits and have continued to build infrastructure to demand rather than to spec.

The Worli sealink is a good case in point. It is only half finished, with its second set of lanes still being built. Even so, it does not seem very full even at rush hour - nothing like the GW Bridge in New York.

In many ways the choices we make in India are the sum of thousands of private sector bets; and very few private sector bets, except in low value added sectors, have been made for exports. The average Indian businessman does not believe in the power of exports except as a necessary evil; very little fixed investment caters to exports. Perhaps we should listen to them and can the pundits?

Which means a very different set of policies will be shortly required for our external sector - oil being the major determinant and the rupee rate the outcome.