THE THIRD MINISTERIAL MEETING OF THE PACIFIC ALLIANCE IS HELD IN CARTAGENA

• The Pacific Alliance Ministers reviewed the progress made by the various technical groups.

• The topics that will be addressed by the presidents at the May summit were reviewed.

• The Mexican delegation was led by Economy Secretary Ildefonso Guajardo and, on behalf of the Foreign Secretary, by the Undersecretary for Latin America and the Caribbean, Vanessa Rubio Marquez.

The Secretaries and Deputy Secretaries of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade of Chile, Colombia, Peru and Mexico met in Cartagena, Colombia, to receive a progress report on fulfillment of the presidential mandates agreed on at the sixth summit of the Pacific Alliance that was held in Santiago, Chile in January.

During the ministerial meeting, the resolutions adopted by the technical groups were reviewed and the progress made in trade and integration (tariff liberalization, rules of origin, technical barriers to trade, regulatory reform, intellectual property, government procurement, sanitary and phytosanitary measures), services and capital, mobility of people, cooperation and institutional issues, was discussed.

The Secretaries of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade worked on the preparation and content of the seventh summit of the Alliance that will be held next May in Cali, Colombia.

The Pacific Alliance has attracted considerable international interest, proof of which has been the inclusion of Costa Rica, Panama, Australia, Canada, Spain, New Zealand, Uruguay, Japan and Guatemala as observers.

The Pacific Alliance is a regional integration initiative formed by Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru on April 28, 2011. Some of its goals are to gradually move towards the free movement of goods, services, capital and people and be a platform for policy, trade and economic integration and that positions the region globally, with special emphasis on the Asia Pacific.

The four countries together are the equivalent of the ninth largest economy in the world with USD$1.9 trillion (the U.S. is USD$15.1 trillion and China is USD$7.3 billion).

The total trade of the Pacific Alliance was USD$1.053 billion, which accounts for 48 percent of total trade in Latin America.

For Mexican producers, the Pacific Alliance represents a potential market of 93 million consumers, which could primarily benefit our SMEs due to our shared language, culture and related economic models.