The Andean Community and the United States: Towards a New Cooperation Agenda for Competitiveness and Social Inclusion

Speech of the Secretary General of the Andean Community, Ambassador Allan Wagner Tizón, in the VIII Annual Conference of the Andean Development Corporation on Trade and Development in the Americas Washington, DC., September 9, 2004

The Andean Community faces the responsibility of assisting member states to tackle the main challenge they face: to solve simultaneously their internal as well as their external agendas. That means the need to address successfully development with social inclusion and to attain an adequate insertion in the global economy.

The Andean Presidents undertook this challenge when they met last July in Quito and after an intensive debate they decided to hold a special Summit Meeting next December in Cuzco to examine four main subjects:

The promotion of a new territorial development strategy through target regions suitable for building democratic governance and social cohesion on the basis of their local capabilities.

The debate of a concept of a “Sustainable State” capable of implementing sustained social policies in a context of strengthened democracy and human rights.

The promotion of social cohesion in the Andean region through the exchange of successful experiences in the implementation of social policies within the context of the Millennium Development Goals.

The strengthening of a free and transparent multilateral trading system with increased market access for our exports and improved terms of trade.

The legitimate goal to pursue free trade and investment in the Americas, in a framework of democracy and peace among nations, should be accompanied by a concerted effort to develop competitiveness, support productive adjustment and provide increased market opportunities to small and medium enterprises, both urban and rural, in which millions of Andean citizens work with the hope of a better future in spite of the uncertainties of the present.

The launching of a new program of development cooperation between the United States and the Andean Community in order to foster competitiveness and social inclusion may be the signal that many citizens of our region are waiting to engage themselves more fully in the quest to reach global markets, many of which can’t envisage yet the advantages of an FTA in spite governments’ efforts to emphasize its potential advantages.

Developing competitiveness and achieving social inclusion will be crucial for building a two-way street in the internationalization process of our economies and for bridging the historical social gap of poverty, exclusion and inequality that our countries still face. It will require huge amounts of investments and financing that our countries can’t provide through public expenditures due to fiscal constraints and debts ceilings they have to maintain. New ways for encouraging investment in infrastructure through concessions and private-public partnerships, fostering technological innovation, special programs for improving competitiveness of SMES and promoting rural development, as well as devising new innovative financial mechanisms to enable increased public investment in education and health –as requested by the Rio in their summit meeting in Cuzco last year- should be some of the main elements of such a program.

We live a very important moment in the Andean region. Never has been so clear the close relationship between the internal and the external agenda of our countries individually and as a whole. This should conduct them to become a more integrated and stable community but at the same time relations with other countries should become platforms for productive development and social cohesion.

That is why cooperation and solidarity are needed not only among the Andean countries but also within the Inter American community in order to foster together democracy, development and integration in our hemisphere.

I urge the Inter American Dialogue, the OAS, CAF and the IDB to take up the challenge of helping us to build this agenda for a new partnership between the Andean Community and the United States.

Washington DC, 9 August 2004.