The Diplomat
The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, said yesterday, during the opening session of the Summit between the European Union (EU) and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in Brussels, that the meeting represents a “historic opportunity” to continue promoting and perfecting the relationship between Europe and Latin America and expressed his wish that it would not be necessary to wait another eight years to hold a new summit. Having said that, he left the EU capital and absented himself from the gala dinner hosted by the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, to participate in a PSOE election rally in Huesca.
During his speech, Pedro Sánchez stated that one of the priorities of the Spanish Presidency of the Council of the European Union is to “move towards a fairer, more united and resilient Europe” and that to achieve this goal it is necessary to consolidate the EU’s strategic relations with Latin America and the Caribbean. “The current geopolitical, environmental and social context requires redoubling efforts and adapting bi-regional cooperation to challenges that cannot be delayed,” he warned.
Sánchez also recalled that, in the last four years, bilateral trade between the two regions has increased by 40%, reaching a total volume of 369 billion euros in bi-regional exchanges in 2022, and warned of the importance of concluding and implementing agreements such as those reached between the EU and Chile, Mexico, Mercosur or Central America because they will be beneficial for both Europe and Latin America and will help to address the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development.
The head of the Executive also stressed that the EU is today the leading investor in Latin America and that it is essential to “strengthen relations between Latin America and the Caribbean and the European Union” through direct investments by European companies. In this regard, he announced that Spain will contribute to the Global Gateway initiative with a financing package of 9.4 billion euros for the coming years with the aim of generating “prosperity and to do so with the purpose of creating fairer societies”. Global Gateway is an initiative launched in December 2021 by the European Commission and EU High Representative Josep Borrell to jointly provide €300 billion to the digital, energy and transport sectors between 2021 and 2027 and strengthen health, education and research systems in emerging and developing countries and globally.
Pedro Sánchez also called for the Summit to help develop “a roadmap and a permanent mechanism for consultation and agreement on global challenges that affect both regions equally, such as climate change, irregular migration or social and territorial inequality”, and made “an explicit call for meetings like today’s to never again take eight years” (the last EU-CELAC Summit was held in 2015).
At the end of his speech, and after participating in the family photo, Sánchez headed to Brussels airport to transfer to a PSOE electoral event in Huesca together with the head of list for Zaragoza and current Minister of Education and Vocational Training, Pilar Alegría, which prevented him from attending the gala dinner offered by Charles Michel to the participants in the Summit. At the end of the meeting, he returned to Brussels to participate tomorrow in the second day of the Summit, before taking the plane again to participate in another electoral event in San Sebastian. After the call of the early general elections on July 23rd, the Government assured that Sánchez would attend the Summit despite its coincidence with the electoral campaign.
Business Forum
In the morning, Mr. Sánchez participated in the inauguration of the EU-CELAC Business Forum, organized by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and attended by representatives of the private sector from Europe and Latin America and international financial institutions.
At the meeting, the President of the Commission announced an investment of 45 billion euros to implement projects related to new technologies in Latin American and Caribbean countries, and Pedro Sánchez stressed the importance of three areas for strengthening economic relations on both sides of the Atlantic: trade, a shared investment agenda and the mobilization of the private sector around this agenda.
He also highlighted the boom in interregional trade and emphasized the complementarity of the two economies. “Latin America and the Caribbean have an abundance of energy and mineral resources, while Europe has the capital, technology and know-how that Latin America needs for its development,” said Sánchez. “Eighty-five percent of lithium resources, 40 percent of biodiversity or 33 percent of fresh water reserves are in Latin America,” he added.
Regarding pending trade agreements Pedro Sánchez assured that, after twenty years of negotiations, the two regions have “a unique window of opportunity” to ratify during the Spanish Presidency the Free Trade Agreement between the EU and Mercosur. “This association between the EU and Latin America would encompass 1.1 billion people, 14% of the world’s population and 21% of the world’s GDP” and would place both regions at GDP levels similar to those of the US economy and higher than China’s, he warned.
The permanent secretary of the Council of Ibero-American Businessmen (CEIB), Narciso Casado, and the vice-president of the CEOE, and president of the Institute of Economic Studies-IEE, Íñigo Fernández de Mesa, participated in the same forum. In his speech, Casado called for “strengthening the mutually beneficial ties between the European Union and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States and giving new impetus to the conclusion and ratification of agreements with Chile, Mexico and Mercosur on the occasion of the EU CELAC summit”.
