A Strategic Dialogue

The tour through three Latin American countries (Brazil, Chile and El Salvador) that President Barack Obama just finished should encourage us to keep examining the state of economic relations between the United States and the region. An in-depth debate and strategic dialogue in the immediate future will allow us to advance toward new hemispherical initiatives in the commercial, investment and development fields with mutual benefits.

The United States, a principal investor in the region, can be an active partner of Latin America and the Caribbean in the continental effort to achieve development with equality.

The same day Obama spoke to the region from Chile, the Latin American & Caribbean Economic Commission (CEPAL) launched a report seeking to contribute to said debate.

In CEPAL, we believe that today that the conditions to take advantage of new commercial cooperative opportunities between the United States and the region are a given, since both face similar challenges within the framework of the current interdependent and globalized economy beyond the obvious differences of scale and party points.

The U.S. continues to be the main individual trade partner of Latin America and the Caribbean, and the region’s exports to that country are more diversified than those destined for the European Union or Asia. The North American nation also continues to be the largest individual investor in the area, representing 34.7 percent of the accumulated cash flow from direct foreign investment received between 1999 and 2009.

Notwithstanding all of the above, the U.S.’s participation in regional foreign business has reduced in the last decade as the weight of the economies of China and other emerging countries grows. In exports, its participation dropped from 59.7 percent in 2000 to 40.1 percent in 2009, and in imports from 49.3 percent to 31.2 percent during the same period.

Throughout the world there is renewed interest in strengthening commercial ties with Latin America and the Caribbean. Nevertheless, in the last few years the U.S. has proven that it lacks a strategic vision toward the region in this respect, which we hope grows under the principles of “association between equals” and the development according to the reality of each country proposed by Obama in Chile.

For now there are obstacles that we haven’t been able to overcome: The free trade treaties signed by Colombia and Panama in 2006 and 2007, respectively, still haven’t been presented to the United States Congress for their approval. The preferential tariff programs that benefit the Andean countries and others in the region are currently suspended in the same manner.

We believe it’s time to work together to conclude the Doha Round of the World Trade Organization in 2011, and that it’s time to open dialogue between the U.S. and the countries in the region that participate in the G20. It’s also convenient to establish an integrated economic cooperation program.

The region should consolidate its economic recovery and maintain a path of sustained growth, which implicates higher industrialization, overcoming the surpluses in technology and innovation and being a protagonist for vibrant intraregional and international trade.

Only if by this route we create more and better examples — productive ones and ones with rights — can we then eradicate poverty and build a future with equality for everyone. I insist that the U.S. can be an active partner of Latin America and the Caribbean in this effort.