Japan and Latin America and the Caribbean look to reinforce relationships when high-ranking officers from their public and private sectors meet at the Japan – Latin America and the Caribbean Global Partnership symposium this week in Tokyo.
The symposium aims to increase mutual knowledge and new forms of partnership at a time when Japan is exploring new global trade and investment opportunities, and Latin American is pursuing greater trade liberalization, regional integration and insertion into the global economy.
Latin American countries have been strengthening development partnerships in Asia as evidenced by last year's free trade agreement between Chile and Korea and between Mexico and Japan. There have also been enhanced cross-investment and increased trade relations between China and several countries in the region.
Latin America offers Japanese investors access to resources and markets that can support the growing needs of the Japanese economy. These opportunities include Latin America's wealth of natural resources; a young, trainable and low-cost labor force; appropriate macroeconomic and financial policies that promote a favorable foreign investment climate and market access; increasingly open economies committed to trade liberalization and regional integration initiatives; and democratic institutions that support participatory approaches for advancing sustainable development.
Jointly sponsored by the IDB and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), the symposium is the first of a series of events leading up to the IDB's Annual Meeting to be held in Okinawa in April 2005. Japan has been a non-borrowing member country of the Bank since 1976 and provides three Japan Trust Funds administered by the IDB.
“The IDB Group recognizes the great contribution that Japan has been making for many years, through allocating financial, technical and human resources, to advance the social and economic development of its member countries in Latin America and the Caribbean,” stated Fausto Medina-López, deputy representative of the Bank's office in Japan.