 So welcome again to this session and let me set the context for our discussion today. First point that I would like to make is that at 3% global trade has grown in 2015 at a sluggish rate for the fourth consecutive year relative to the pre-crisis levels of 7%. The real GDP, the global trade performance has also been slightly below the real GDP growth. And there are a combination of cyclical and structural factors for this. In terms of the cyclical factors, these are related with the weakness in global demand. Trade grows slowly because GDP grows slowly. And originally this was more related to the high-income countries who were at the epicenter of the crisis, but as from 2015 we have seen a weakness in emerging markets that has contributed now to this global trade slowdown. Two important factors are relevant here. One is of course the slowdown in commodity prices. And the other one is the transition in China to a different growth model. So these two factors have come together and are impacting trade performance as we speak. The other set of factors is more of a structural nature and relates to the relationship between trade and income. In the 1990s, for example, trade used to grow two or three times faster than GDP. But today this ratio is more one to one. And again, there are several causes for this. But one important cause may be that very important trade reforms, trade liberalization reforms that took place some years ago have already matured if we come to think about the impact, for example, of the establishment of the WTO or the negotiation of NAFTA some 20 years ago. And another factor may be the changes taking place in global value chains. And we may talk a little bit more about this in the course of this discussion. Now I guess this relative negative backdrop, we have some very positive energy coming out in the area of trade negotiations. And most of this action is taking place now at the regional level in what we call the American regional trade agreements. So what are these mega-regionals and why are they important? As we know, regional trade agreements have been with us for a long time. But mega-regionals are, if you wish, an animal of a different kind by virtue of their scope, by virtue of their coverage, and by virtue of their impact. So let's take, for example, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, TPP. TPP is an agreement that covers trade among 12 countries, five in this continent, Canada, the US, Mexico, Chile, and Peru, Australia, New Zealand, and five countries in the region of Asia Pacific. TPP, according to the different studies that have been made, will contribute to increase GDP. The estimates vary depending on the study, but all of them see a positive impact on TPP on the global economy and on its members. So in terms of scope, this is very relevant. In terms of coverage, TPP does not only include your traditional areas of trade, for example liberalization of trading goods, but it's also very ambitious in terms of bringing new topics to the table, including rules and disciplines in areas as important as digital trade, state-owned enterprises, competition policy, investment, intellectual property, and others. And finally, in terms of impact, as I said, very positive for members, but also impacting non-members, and in particularly driving reforms in both member countries and other countries that are aspiring either to become members or to compete with TPP members. Likewise, we have the negotiations going on of the Trade and Investment Transatlantic Partnership between the US and the EU, the RCEP initiative in Asia, the Regional Cooperation Economic Partnership, and finally, of course, here in Latin America, we also have the Pacific Alliance, a very ambitious trade and integration project that even goes beyond trade and integration. So this, I think, is a little bit the context in which our discussions will take place today. And to help us understand where is Latin America in this context, we have a wonderful set of panelists here today. So let me introduce the panelists to you. We have Maria Claudia LaCouture, the Minister of Trade, Industry, and Tourism of Colombia. We have Mr. Jin Heming, a special representative of China to Latin America. We have Mrs. Gabriela Ramos, a special counselor to the Secretary General of OECD, Chief of Staff and OECD Sherpa at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. And last but not least, we have Mr. Fabian Hill, President of Latin America from the Dow Chemical Company. So to start our discussion, let me first turn over to you, Minister LaCouture, to ask you, where do you see the trade agenda going forward in Latin America? Muchas gracias. Thank you very much, Annabel, for this introduction. And welcome to Colombia, to you all. Welcome to Medellin. We hope that this is and continues to be a great event for all of you and that you visit us again soon, not only for business but also for tourism. The international context, as was very well presented by Annabel, is a context that shows us some difficulties leading to a global contraction for reasons that I'm not going to repeat, but that make trade agreements much more relevant and important. When you look at country dynamics, if you look at trade dynamics and taking into account Colombia's internal dynamics, we find that increasingly trade agreements become an important tool to be able to penetrate not only international markets but also to create growth within each of our countries. And why do we talk about growth? Because growth isn't limited to internal development but also production chains and linking those two international value chains, which are currently the main mechanism for international trade. If you look at trade trends and what is being negotiated in international venues, of course, commodities form an important part of this process but also value-added products with a medium or high relationship with technology or that are seeking to link into additional processing are becoming an increasing part of international trade. So these agreements are leading our countries, particularly within the global context, to take this variable into account. In addition, international trade work is increasingly leading to nearby countries and regions to find ways of working together toward these international agreements. In addition, if we look at the international agreements that have been signed more recently, the multilateral or plurilateral agreements, we see that they are complementing each other significantly. And Colombia has made a vital decision for its development, which is to be part of these international value chains and production chains and global trade. And the question is how do we move forward with further agreements? Colombia has existing trade agreements. We have three that have been negotiated and ready to go into effect with 49 countries. And we know and we trust that this process is going to increasingly support industrial production, complemented with actions that will allow us to improve our competitiveness and internationalization. All of these variables cannot be delinked. Trade agreements, competitiveness and the productivity that needs to improve thanks to good practices, technology, transfer. Once we open the doors to new opportunities arriving to the country and also through our own participation in international markets. And of course, in this international context, agreements are essential for again, global value chains and production chains. Over to you to bring the business perspective to the trade agenda in Latin America. Thank you very much. Good morning. Thank you for this opportunity. It is an honor to present Dow here in the panel and together with the audience to think together about these important issues. Dow is a company that has been in Latin America for 60 years. We have seen it all in these 60 years. It is a global company, but with culture that as in many other companies, culture that has grown locally and over 60 years, like I say, we have seen it all. And nonetheless, we are very optimistic with respect to the next few decades in Latin America. A couple of days ago, I was meeting with another with other Dow executives in the US and somebody asked me, how difficult is it to do business in the midst of the Latin American crisis? And I would tell them, it's the best crisis we've had in decades. What do you mean the best crisis in decades? It is because it's a crisis that takes us in a very different moment. And there's also a generational shift. There are leaders in the private sector and in the public sector who have a common vision, who have common issues in the region that are being addressed. And the question of trade and global regional trade is fundamental. Today in Latin America, we have practically 40% of all people living in subnormal conditions or conditions that are lower than expected. 60 million tons of food are wasted every year. We have serious infrastructure problems in countries like Colombia and Argentina. Serious infrastructure investments are needed. The good news is that technology is there and it can help us address these problems. The other good news is that it is affordable, the technology that is. And here is where, for us, the private sector comes into play and the importance of trade. Because for these technologies, which are part of complex value chains, often global value chains, but many of which are regional, the key is to accelerate, to make sure that it moves at the speed of the times. Technologies, science, innovation and talent need to move in our countries at a completely different pace. We need to facilitate the movement of all of these production factors. That is the key in which the connection between the public and the private sector will be the key to address these problems. At Dow, we believe that an agenda where sustainability as a business facilitator between the public and the private sectors addressing those major issues over the next 10 or 15 years will open great opportunities for business, for investment, for human development and for job creation. That is why we're so optimistic for the next few years. And we have great expectations for open markets and broad train agreements beyond discussing barriers and taxes alone. Thank you very much, Fabian. Ambassador Ying Himing, now allow me to hand you the floor. Good morning. Thank you very much, first of all, to the forum for the invitation that gives me the opportunity to participate for the first time in this very important gathering. Trade between China and Latin America and the Caribbean in the new century has been developing at a steady pace, and we have average annual growth of 30 percent. The percentage of trade between China and this region occupies since the year 2000 2.7 percent. However, in the year 2014, this share of trade for China takes up 6.1 percent of all of Chinese foreign trade. This is a very significant increase. It is undeniable the role played by commodity trading. It is very important in trade between China and this region. However, last year, due to the international juncture that we all know very well, trade between China and this region decreased by 10.28 percent. In the year 2014, our trade reached 263,600 million dollars between the parties. But last year, it went down to 236,500 million dollars. However, this drop is due mainly to the drop in prices rather than the amount of imports from this region that come into China. In fact, the quantities have remained relatively stable. Facing these situations, such as the trends in the global economy, the Chinese government has taken a series of measures during the visits conducted by our president and our prime minister to Latin America. The Chinese launched a series of proposals together with a set of concrete measures. We now have a five-year program with Latin America. It is called the Joint Action Plan. And we have some key sectors to work on together. We also have special funds in order to support cooperation projects between China and Latin America and the Caribbean. So we are fully confident in the future, both in the outlook for development in Latin America and the Caribbean as for cooperation between both parties. In terms of trade toward the future, we have a vision. We believe there are three main trends in the relations between China and Latin America. First of all, traditional trade, despite its difficulties, will continue to be an important factor, to play an important role in trade between the two parties. This is a consequence of the complementarity of the economies, the Chinese and the Latin American economy. Last year we suffered a downward turn. However, in the first quarter of this year, we have seen a recovery of imports from this region into China, such as iron ore and copper imports increased by 56 percent, oil imports increased by 28 percent, etc. That is the first point of the three. The second trend will be a new point for growth in trade between China and Latin America, namely the trade in agricultural products. In China, we now have enormous demand for agricultural products coming from Latin America, such as soybean, beef, wine, fruits, and Colombian coffee, of course. They come to China this year. In the first quarter, imports of these agricultural products increased by 28.5 percent. And this means 16.2 percent of all Latin American imports into China. So this will be a new point for growth in trade. The third trend is cooperation in industrial capacity, namely infrastructure projects and so forth. China has implemented a series of measures by which priority areas and specific funds were set up to support these types of projects in Latin America. We believe that this is of the foremost importance for this new era, that is that cooperation should not be limited to trade and much less to trade in commodities, but rather we should open new areas, we should open new opportunities to work together and to win it together. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Ambassador. Now, Gabriela, what is your vision on the Latin American trade agenda? To English. Well, I think that, Anabel, you really put the debate in the very right framework, because if anything is certain, is that the very positive external environment that we have had during the last two decades is not going to be there. The fact that trade growth has half and investment growth has half for the last almost eight years since the crisis was erected, I think it really calls us to rethink how are we going to be pushing for the development path that Latin America needs. But in any case, I think that Latin America with all these trade agreements is a champion in terms of positioning themselves, the countries, right at the center of the trade and investment global agenda. I believe that all of the countries in the region really put a lot of emphasis in getting themselves engaged with these frameworks that give certainty. And if there is something that is lacking in the world and that it fuels this weak demand and weak trade growth, it's lack of confidence. And therefore, the fact that you have these frameworks that give certainty to investors, I think is pretty good. And so we need to make the best out of them. You have built it up, let's make the best out of them. To do so, we have two elements that I think are very important. First of all, because you, each country, have really negotiated, minister mentioned 11 trade agreements. Mexico has, I don't know, 30, every Costa Rica, you were the minister to negotiating all these trade agreements. You have a myriad of regulations than overlapped among themselves. The spaghetti bowl that we call in terms of the regional trade agreements and the investment trade agreements with very different provisions and very different qualities applied to Latin America. And that might create some problems in terms of overlapping of regulatory practices, requirements for business investments and also different definitions depending on the region and on the trade agreement, would you locate yourself? And that is very important. So I think there is a need to have some kind of consolidation of measures to rethink global issues in terms of what Latin America is going to be requesting international investors. One specific area is, for example, rules of origin. All these agreements, some are very basic, just market access, some others are just dealing with very complicated regulatory, competition, environment, human rights issues. But the fact is that on the rules of origin, how do we consolidate and how do we develop something that is more coherent and that creates the synergies among all these regional and bilateral trade agreements? So I think that's a very important element. The second element is beyond the trade policy. And this has to do of what countries need to be doing to really take advantage of the trade frameworks that you have. And this is behind the mortar measures that the OECD would like to think of trade policy as the ultimate structural reform agenda because this brings to the elements of the competitiveness of the countries that will really allow them to take advantage. And actually, we have not been able to really take advantage of those because of the bottlenecks that we have in our economies that do not help us to really move forward. And with that, I mean infrastructure investment, logistics, services, but many other issues related to trade facilitation measures, how to improve the efficiency of our customs agencies. All the behind the border issues that really do not allow us to be better placed to take advantage of it. And this is shown by the fact that with all these agreements, Latin America only had a very low content added to the global value chains of 9%. And if you think about regional value chains, they're very, very low. 9% compared to almost 50% in Europe or 45% in Asia, which is what really builds up this interconnectedness and the possibility to create the productive capacities to take advantage of the frameworks. So it's a pending agenda, but it's very linked and to overcome what the ambassador was mentioning. How do we overcome just locating ourselves in the commodity sector? Or how do you escape in the case of Mexico, a Mexican, the being the assembly parts without really getting into the transfer of technology, building up the systems inside the country to take advantage and the supply chains that are so important that we really need to be looking after is beyond the trade agenda. But I think it's as important to take advantage of it. Thank you very much, Gabriela. And in different ways, all of you have been referring to the importance of economic diversification, of adding more value, of connecting to global and regional value chains. So I would like to explore a little bit this topic a bit further. Just an announcement to the audience. I will come back to you in a few moments for your questions to the panelists. So please start thinking about them and I'll be with you in a few minutes. So minister, I know that you have been working in previous capacities as well, and of course in your current capacity as minister to try to diversify production and exports in Colombia and add value in the country. What can you share about that Colombian experience with us? Thank you very much. Colombia, like many Latin American countries, has exportable basket that is very much concentrated in commodities or raw materials. Now, one of the topics that has been worked on is that we have this exportable offer, but in addition, we have this accumulation of development through small and medium-sized businesses, micro enterprises and SMEs in Colombia. Just to give you an idea of the evolution that has taken place in recent years, Colombia today, or rather five years ago, had approximately 1.4 million businesses, formally established businesses in the country. And out of that set, a quick calculation tells us that only 0.3% of those businesses are exporting on a constant basis. That's not only the case in Colombia, it happens internationally as well and for international trade. Now, how have we, and this has been a guideline coming from the national government and from some of my predecessors, Minister Granados, in fact, has joined us and he began this policy of diversification. So how do we link together the evolution from commodities? Understanding the importance of avoiding being dependent on an exchange rate, being dependent on commodity prices, at the same time as we develop the exporters, business fabric, so to speak, these were the two major variables for us in the past five years. And we found an additional level that needed to be developed, which is regionalization. Colombia is a country of regions that has great virtues, but it also has weaknesses that need to be strengthened. Every subnational region has a different capacities, different competitive advantages, and we, as you know, have a country cost with an infrastructure lag and other points that need to be strengthened. So if we look at the fact that our country has great dependence on commodities, more than 40% of our exports depend on these sectors. On the other hand, we have a group of small and medium-sized businesses that are only exporting 0.3% of which are exporting on an ongoing basis, and with the additional challenge of our subnational regionalization, the question is how do we improve our competitiveness and how do we internationalize our economy and why internationalization? Because it is through internationalization that over the past five years, we had more than 2,000 new businesses join the exporting economy. And what tools did we use for this? And this is an interesting experience. If you look at an SME, there is a myth that these businesses don't have the muscle to export. However, what we found is that those businesses are more willing to create value added, and they do have the capacity to quickly implement a new strategy, to adopt new trends, to find new consumers, to develop their products in ways that employ more technology than established large businesses. So we developed a set of tools that would allow companies to understand how to improve their competitiveness, how to improve their productivity, how to expand their logistical capacity. These are things that may look very simple, but can be rather complex. How do we identify specific actions that can help them to reduce delivery times, independently of the country's logistical complexity? And now we have micro enterprises that very much understand cost reduction, productivity improvements, and are exporting to distant markets. We have a very interesting case of small farmers who are exporting from Caqueta, which is a very distant remote region in Colombia that has been part of the armed conflict that has had connectivity problems. And we have exporters from Caqueta to Hong Kong of ornamental products. And there is a whole backdrop of logistics and productivity improvements that underscore that improvement. How do we maintain regionalization with sectors that allow businesses to understand their competitive advantages? As part of those advantages, how do you best make use of trade agreements? And through their eyes, we are looking at the necessary tools that the national government can provide to improve their competitiveness. We then scale it to costs, to entry into markets, market access, and we provide ongoing support to businesses from the demand side rather than the supply side. What are the actions that need to be improved both in the quality of the product as in the exporting process in order to reach those international markets? Thanks to this, Colombian entrepreneurs today have the possibility to export more, to grow not only the number of countries that we're exporting to, but also to diversify. Today Colombia is reaching more than 170 companies, countries rather, with the varied products. We have a 2.5 increase in value added exports. And businesses now are not only diversifying, but we're also finding specific market niches that are so important for our exporters. Not necessarily by the mere fact of making a product, do you have to sell it to the mass market? We've been working also on an exporting culture with entrepreneurs in order to arrive at very specific market niches. Not necessarily going after a large volume of consumers, but rather the specific relevant consumer for each product. The exercise has been extremely interesting in these five years and it has allowed us to demonstrate and also to balance this drop in the prices of oil and minerals, which Colombia has depended on for so long. And also to find a way to avoid stigmatizing these sectors because they are still important sectors within our national economy and the world economy. And of course, they need to be studied to find better ways of making use of them nationally, internationally. But in terms of trade, what Colombia has achieved in the past five years and experience has shown us that diversification is necessary. ECLAC, in fact, showed that Colombia was one of the main countries, maybe number two, that has achieved economic diversification in the past five years in its export in number of countries, number of products, and also strengthening that exporter's business fabric that has led to greater volumes again, more products, product diversification, and many new markets. I can't say that our work is done. Most of our work is, in fact, ahead of us, but we believe that this has been a very interesting exercise and it will bear fruit in the medium term. Thank you very much, minister. I would now like to invite the audience to ask questions. We have a microphone here at the front. Carlos Eduardo Represas from Mexico. I think that we should touch on the topic of trade within Latin America. We actually see that the rest of the world benefits more from trade with Latin America than we Latin Americans benefit of our own trade. And there is no doubt that all efforts at integrating our continent since the Montevideo Treaty have not worked and we have not managed to make progress in a process of integration that will help us expand markets, complement markets, bring together competitive advantages. And I believe that with the Pacific Alliance, finally and for the first time, an ambitious perspective for the integration of Latin America that goes beyond the mere trade exchange, even trying to achieve a freedom of transit of people in Latin America. But I would like to know how far this can go. Of course, I would like to hear the opinion of the Colombian ministry, but also of the Chinese, the ambassador from China. We'd like to see or to hear how they see the Pacific Alliance, how OECD also sees how far this integration effort can reach, which is not limited to the Pacific shorelines. The president of Argentina has recently spoken about the possibility of joining the Pacific Alliance. So I think that this is a very important effort at integration that is taking place in the region. So my question is, what can we expect? How far will this effort reach? Thank you very much, Carlos, for bringing to the table the topic of the Pacific Alliance, which is very relevant. So I would like to start with Avian asking each to refer for one minute, give us a very short answer to see if we have an opportunity to take two more questions from the audience. Thank you, and I agree 100% much to what I referred at the beginning were intra-regional problems, more than problems with the outside. And for us, that is the big limitation for the companies, moving products in the region, agricultural products, and the specific segments of high-tech manufacturing. I think that much of what happens to us is that we need to sit together in the private sector with the regulatory agencies to give them our views and to create awareness with them. We have policies that facilitate things, but our ships have to stay in port, our trucks have to stay still, and that eliminates productivity. And this is just to move products within the region. Sometimes products coming from Argentina to Colombia have to pay 50% duty, so that leaves us outside competition and products produced in Colombia, but which are more competitively made in Argentina. So we need to solve that, and we have potential to accelerate economic growth with the technology available at the present time. Thank you, Fabiana and Gabriella. I agree, I think that one of the advantages of the Pacific Alliances that it is not limited just to trade, the agenda is very ambitious. They want to look into cooperation in regulatory matters. You know that the business community knows that they have to comply with very different regulations in different countries. We, it also considers behind the border measures, which are so important in terms of investment in services and logistics. They contemplate cooperation in terms of improving customs. Everything that has to do with moving products, moving products, moving products, I think that makes us feel more confident and in the relationship with China, we can see that by just taking advantage of the space available to invest in certain sectors, we can increase integration impressively. Indeed, we did this Latin American outlook with China and Latin America, and it comprises many of these elements. Angel Melguiso is here. He is the chief editor of that publication and it gives us many lessons for the Pacific Alliance because it focuses on those niches where we can make progress via regulation where we can make progress via investment in infrastructure and logistics and where there can be complementary action with investors. Latin American investors have a lot to do also. I think that in general, many investors in Latin America have become contented with just being present in the low echelons of the value chains in the commodities because it is easier, it is faster, but there is low private investment in R&D, for example, research and development. So how are we going to enter other segments if we do not invest in research and development, in skills, and we do so public and private together? And I think that in order to take advantage of things, this has to do with the integration of public and private efforts in order to really move this integration agenda forward. Thank you. Reducing cost to negotiate complementary agenda in productivity, increasing productivity. All of these are very relevant topics. Ambassador, please. Pacific Alliance. It is a more recent organization in the region, but perhaps it is the most dynamic of all. China has attributed great importance to the relationship with this alliance. We are observers in the alliance. At the end of April, I visited Lima and I had some discussions with the organization and at the end of this month, Chinese representative will be taking part in the summit of the alliance that will take place in Santiago, Chile. In April, in Lima, we arrived at some consensus and this could be the first step to cooperation, for example, in the promotion of cooperation between SMEs and education and also in the streamlining of customs procedures in order to enhance the flow of trade between the parties. We believe that this is a new platform to work together. Thank you. Thank you, Ambassador Minister. Yes, indeed, for us as a country, as a member of the Pacific Alliance, this is one of the most ambitious policies that have ever been established in foreign trade and it is not just in terms of trade. The Pacific Alliance does not wish to be a trade agreement. What it wants to achieve is integration and it starts with a very proactive action on the part of the precedents who have wanted it not to be influenced by bureaucracy in its confirmation. It should be a very agile and swift alliance that through the pro-temporary chair will make it an agile organization. That is a very important thing. Additionally, over the past three years, the hard work has been done in order to achieve results. Today, the Alliance includes education, work is being done in terms of allowing transfer and validation of diplomas. If somebody wants to do an internship in another country of the Pacific Alliance, this should be done very quickly, transfer of good practices and know-how and all the process that is required in order to have cooperation and supplementation in different areas. Work is being done in financial cooperation, in integration, in technology and innovation. Indeed, there is a task force that is devoted exclusively to the development in the four countries of joint innovation work in transfer of know-how. There is an infrastructure fund that is also being developed in the Pacific Alliance to exercise joint influence. Also, the trade agreement, which became effective on May of this year. And it is not an agreement that seeks just pseudo-tariff trade, but also quality standardization. So, in summary, this is quite an ambitious and broad alliance at a national level in the four countries. It is a priority and it is also being perceived by the 49 observers who are part of the Pacific Alliance are seeing this as a new way to work on trade, but not only trade, but integration because it goes beyond trade. There is no doubt that the Pacific Alliance is a key component of the Latin American foreign trade agenda. I would like to ask the audience if they have any more questions. Hilbert Domarin from Mexico, along the same lines of the previous comment by Mr. Represas, I think that a key factor to increase inter-regional trade of course is compatibility of policy-making in the case of Mexico, the first trade agreement with Chile, even before the NAFTA agreement in the NAFTA. And it is one of the countries that has the largest number of treaties. And we've worked with Ladi, with FTAA, we've tried to reach agreements with Latin America, but there has been opposition perhaps on the part of Brazil that sometimes positions that have been more or less protectionist, not so the case of Colombia, Chile, and with this alliance, as Carlos Eduardo was mentioning, this Pacific Alliance. Okay, but my point is, it has to do with politics, not only the business aspect, business will always follow the clear incentive of maximizing profit. However, in terms of policy and politics, there are other types of vested interests. I'm worried about the decisions that may be approved in the EU with the potential leaving of England. Will this not be a trend? And will not other countries of Europe leave the market? And will there not be some sort of contagion and also what will happen in the US with Trump, who is anti-free trade agreements? Would this not bring the world to a more protectionist attitude of having less trade agreements? And therefore in Latin America, shouldn't we be prepared and vaccinated against this potential trend? Thank you, Hilbert, I think that you are referring to what we discussed at the beginning, that the external context at the present time is not necessarily the most favorable for the region. I would like to ask the panelists about their opinion and ask them also to tell us in their answer, which I hope will be brief, tell us about their final thoughts about the topic of our discussion in this session. So we, I'll start again with Fabian. Well, referring to public policy from the private standpoint, I think that very specific, very fast action can be implemented regardless of the global trends in these spaces of trade agreements. For example, develop technology for agriculture takes 10 to 15 years from the moment it is created to the moment it is marketed. Why? Because there are many studies required and a lot of work required. And then afterwards in the countries, there's a lot of red tape bureaucracy. Each country has its own space. I think that there's a way to streamline all this. And this includes the trade agreements. This may facilitate cooperation around regulatory matters and accelerate the processes. So instead of taking 15 years, take much less. And that has a clear impact on productivity not only for the business itself but also for the entire value chain. So it is important to deal with those very practical issues regardless of what the trend may be in the world of the large economic blocks. We can solve very specific intra-area problems and become more productive. As a final message, again, I believe what I said at the beginning we're very optimistic about the future and what a trade agreement can contribute to economic growth in Latin America. We have an advantage and it is that both private and public players in this new generation of leaders in the region coincided around a common agenda. The great issues of society in Latin America are great opportunities for business at the same time and a great opportunity for investment. And I believe that if we work together public and private players, we can get the best from Latin America. Latin people are recognized for their creativeness for their hard work, for their collaboration. That is our brand. And we need to avail ourselves of these treaties, expand them, have high standards, bring new technologies. As I said at the beginning, they are available. They are within reach and we need to implement them now. We make all this thing easy so that the committees can have access to them. Thank you, Gauriela. Well, a very complex question because at the end of the day, what is happening is that these large multilateral agreements, not only in Latin America but in the rest of the world, are perceived by the public opinion and something that, and what does it have to do with me? They really have not managed to improve the prospects of economic growth in general because of the crisis. We are at a time of low growth and high unemployment. So this is the right environment to blame the great investors, the great frameworks of international trade that have not been able to translate all this into an improvement of the lives of the population. And this is where the challenge lies, trying to project the possibilities that the countries have when they participate in these agreements, possibilities of improving their economic prospects and outlook. So Latin America doesn't really need treaties and agreement. It needs to use what it has in a more global way. It's not only the better position companies that should benefit from these advantages of the different trade agreements and investment agreements, but that everything should trickle down to the different sectors that usually are left out. And this is very important. However, I would expect that the Brexit will not win and that we'll not have a man in the White House at the end of the day. I think that good judgment will finally prevail and it's in our hands to promote open markets and demonstrate that they're good for the population as a whole. Thank you very much, Gabriella Ambassador. Well, I wanted to say that when we analyze economic and trade cooperation between China and Latin America, we shouldn't focus only on trade or even less on trade around one specific product. We need to do it with a broader vision. We need to consider the growth of investments in Latin America. Last year, despite the grim international circumstances, Chinese investments in Latin America grew by 67% compared with the previous year. And we also need to consider financing. Financing provided by China to support important products for cooperation in production capability, cooperation in infrastructure. I think this is very important today because the relationships between China and Latin America are developing in an omni-directional way. We need to be broader in our assessments. Thank you very much. Thank you, Ambassador. I think that it has been shown over the past few years that at this time, this time that we are living at an international level, integration is necessary and Colombia is convinced of the need to develop policies that will enable us to integrate with the international markets but that it needs to work together with the private sector, private and public together. And in the previous question, I forgot to mention the importance of the Business Council in the Pacific Alliance. It's importance in the process of the alliance and the policies that have been established beyond trade. And that is a reflection of what Colombia has been building over the past few years. The Business Council is not only an entity that wishes to generate ideas and best practices for better integration within the Pacific Alliance, but it also issues guidelines. It establishes what the hurdles are. It determines what the destination should be in order to achieve growth that can develop jointly between the public and the private and the business community. So part of the thing that is seen at a national and international level is a way to look for better integration and the public-private partnership in all areas to enable growth. Because at the end, as President Santos well says, if businesses do well, the government will do well. And that is part of the policy that is being developed not only in Colombia, but also in the Pacific Alliance and with all the countries with which we're working together. Thank you, minister. I would like to thank the participants of this session and to summarize some of our key messages. I think that we could say first that the external context, which in previous years was a favorable for Latin America, is not so favorable at the present time. And in the immediate future, it will not be favorable. But Latin America is well positioned to deal with a more difficult environment. It has a sound base of trade agreements and of integration. And of course, the Pacific Alliance is outstanding amongst them. And it has experience in this regard. However, it has a very important agenda ahead of it, an agenda that seeks to achieve continuous improvement of competitiveness through the improvement of the business environment, inclusion of higher competition policies, improvement of logistics and infrastructure, reduction of trade costs. So it's also an important agenda in terms of increasing productivity. Also an agenda for innovation. All of these, which are aspects that will contribute to enhancing the position of Latin America in the external context and to integrate it with global value chains and to help it derive greater benefit from these trade agreements, which are also a key factor to attract domestic and foreign investment. And in all this, of course, joint work between the private and the public sector. And in a broad dialogue, as the one provided by the World Economic Forum in this occasion, that dialogue will be key also. So again, I wish to thank the panelists and all the participants. Thank you very much.