Address by the Secretary General of the Andean Community, Sebastián Alegrett, at the Thirteenth Andean Presidential Council

Valencia, Venezuela, June 23, 2001

Our integration process has produced concrete and highly promising results since the last Meeting of the Presidential Council in Lima a little over a year ago.

Intracommunity trade, after dropping heavily in 1999, has returned to its upward course and we expect to set a record of 6 billion dollars this year. In the first four months of 2001, intra-Andean exports rose 20%, while the growth of our worldwide exports was under 1%.

This year, the Andean market will become our second most important market after the United States and the primary destination of our exports with the highest value added.

As our own market broadens and is perfected, Andean trade may become the true driving force for our growth and add to our autonomy and competitiveness to assure our countries of an appropriate position in the global economy.

We arrived at this Presidential Summit offering not only economic accomplishments, but also important political advances.

The approval of the Andean Cooperation Plan for the Control of Illegal Drugs and Related Offenses sends an unmistakable message about our determination to attack, using our own approach and strategy, one of the most important problems on the international agenda.

For their part, the decisions adopted by the Foreign Ministers with regard to the free circulation of people and border integration and development policies are a milestone on the road to Andean integration that can only be compared with the launching of the Free Trade Area in 1992 and that contribute decisively to clearing the way to the Common Market.

We have also moved ahead consistently in our negotiations with the Mercosur to establish a Free Trade Area in January 2002, to which we must add the forthcoming adoption of a mechanism for political dialogue between the two blocs and Chile.

In addition to these significant contributions toward the creation of a South American economic and social space, the Andean Community, with its united front in the FTAA negotiations, has given evidence of its political maturity.

The most outstanding accomplishments of this year reveal the essentially political foundations of our progress towards more advanced stages of integration. If we are to become a Common Market by the year 2005, we must obtain a large measure of political will and the continuing leadership that only the Heads of State themselves can supply.

Only thus will we be able to remove the obstacles raised by the increasingly pressing internal and external interests at stake and also overcome the temptation to yield to dead-end technical arguments that could end up by thwarting the attainment of the major political goals set by our statesmen.

That is why it is essential to send a clear sign so that our customs union may be consolidated and perfected as soon as possible through the adoption of the Common External Tariff, in a context of growing macroeconomic policy convergence spurred by the Advisory Council of Treasury or Finance Ministers, Presidents of Central Banks, and Economic Planning Officers.

The importance of the social dimension of our process means that its development cannot be put off. Therefore, it is necessary to incorporate proposals like those of the Venezuelan Presidency for launching a Comprehensive Social Development Plan to address the serious problems of poverty and social exclusion and inequality in the subregion.

In effect, the basic purpose of our integration is not to develop a society of consumers, but to build a society of free citizens with full rights and opportunities for personal and collective fulfillment.

One hundred and eighty years ago, the Battle of Carabobo brought to a close a basic stage in the independence of our continent, releasing the actors to undertake the campaign to free the south, which culminated in Ayacucho.

Months after this great and glorious episode, Bolívar climbed the Potosí. I have often imagined the Libertador, standing on the majestic summit of this mountain --the universal symbol of the wealth and opulence of Spanish America— and telling himself: finally, we are masters of our own destiny.

The Libertador bequeathed that independence to us; let us fulfill our destiny.