The World Economic Forum (WEF) for Latin America concluded that international trade is the alternative for the region to grow again, after the fall in raw material prices.

For two days, in Medellín, Colombia, presidents and ministers of several Latin American countries, heads of multilateral agencies and companies, as well as more than 600 businesspeople met to discuss the future of the region, hit by falling commodity prices. cousins. This factor has been particularly decisive for Latin America, which will contract by 0.5% this year, according to forecasts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Faced with this situation, the WEF has discussed the development of international trade, supported by technology, as a possible path for the region to progress. “We have to start having the capacity, as a region, to raise the bar”, declared the president of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Luis Alberto Moreno, pressuring Latin America to depend only on itself.

One option to achieve the objective is to improve regional trade agreements, as Colombia and Cuba recently did, through a bilateral trade agreement, which implies that 89% of Colombian products enter the island with zero tariffs. Among the products included in the deepening agreement are meat, cocoa, oil, coffee preparations, fruits and fish, as well as textiles and clothing, automobiles, soaps and cosmetics, leather, household appliances, footwear, toys, steel and construction materials. , between others.

According to the Chinese Government representative for Latin American affairs, Yin Hengmin, China continues to be a strong partner, especially with regard to agricultural products. Yin assured that these products could be “a new point of growth between China and Latin America” and highlighted that there is a strong demand for Latin American products in China, which increased imports of these goods from the region by 28. 5%, in the first quarter of this year alone.

The monitoring of trade by technology was also a recurring theme during the two-day forum exemplified by the president of Argentina, Mauricio Macri. “We must stop being the breadbasket of the world. Today we produce food for 400 million people, we have to become the supermarket, which means adding value, technology, brand, design.”, he stated in a talk given with his counterpart Juan Manuel Santos. The Colombian President also spoke about added value and listed the segments for long-term investment, which will allow achieving “long-term sustainable growth”: infrastructure, competitiveness and technology.

In addition to the issue of technology, another major theme that marked the meeting across the board was the issue of combating corruption, one of the region’s failures and to which one of the conferences was dedicated.

The next edition of the World Economic Forum for Latin America will be held in Buenos Aires in 2017.

Photography: Yashnews.com