ABSTRACT
Radical action was necessary to release the country from the yoke of excessive debt service charges only benefiting the banks. The Government of Peru has proclaimed as a principle that, so long as circumstances remain unchanged, it will allot only a fixed percentage of our hard currency export earnings to servicing the debt. The debt is a monetary obligation, and it is normal that monetary obligations suffer a certain depreciation in function of time. The debt was contracted in a context that supposes a normal flow of income with which it was to be paid, and this income should basically come from external trade. The increase of the debt has been an unfavourable evolution for the debtor countries, Peru among them, but it has not been the only one. Far from being depreciated, the debt has increased substantially in its value, and this in a way that could not be foreseen at the time it was contracted.
