Lima, September 22, 2004. The Andean Council of Foreign Affairs Ministers approved the Social Development Integrated Plan (PIDS), which will permit Andean Community countries to boost social development and face poverty, exclusion and inequality in the sub-region under a community approach.

The PIDS was approved through a community law by Andean Community Foreign Affairs Ministers, on the occasion of the United Nations’ General Assembly held in the City of New York, in the United States.

The adoption of this community strategy is considered as an important landmark in the development of Andean integration social dimension, since it would make it possible to boost domestic policies in the fight against poverty and social injustice.

These problems “are a jeopardy to social cohesion and democratic governance in Andean countries, representing an obstacle for regional integration and their competitive insertion into the global economy”, noted the ministers in the whereas section of the approved Decision.

The execution of the 19 projects comprising the PIDS will be the responsibility of the Andean Council of Social Development Ministers (CADS), a community body created by Decision 592 in July of this year, within the framework of the 15th Meeting of the Andean Presidential Council.

The Council will be entrusted with the preparation of a PIDS Action Plan within the shortest possible time, as well as the creation of national committees to ensure execution and follow up of the projects in each of the Andean countries, in coordination with the CADS.

The national committees will be comprised of not only the government bodies responsible for social policies, but also by representative sectors of an organized civil society and of the academy, within the same line of participating work involved in the PIDS definition and design phase.

In effect, the PIDS is the result of joint and participating work and of consensus reached in national workshops conducted in the past two years, with the participation of institutions from the government and civil society in Andean countries.