Qualifying it as the “Day of Liberation”, on April 2 Trump announced the imposition of “reciprocal” rates to much of the world. However, many were temporarily suspended and there have been agreements with several nations.
Mexico, the largest commercial partner of the United States, has fought mostly thanks to the North American Trade Agreement, T-MEC, but its great American agency places it in a delicate situation. Even so, some tariffs persist and on August 1 Trump gave him a 90 -day extension.
“More than replace (imports from the United States), I would use the word diversify. It is something that we, from ECLAC, are recommending,” Salazar said in an interview with Reuters Thursday afternoon, citing the “uncertainty” caused by the policies of the Republican leader.
He added that it is aware that diversification is not achieved “from one day to another” so that the agency is recommending to its members “to renew alliances”, and gave as an example a commercial agreement between Mercosur and the European Union that, after two decades of negotiations, closed in December and would be approved before summer.
He also asked to explore trade and investment channels with Asian, African countries and, “deepen the regional integration of Latin America.”
Visiting Mexico for a regional conference on women, Salazar acknowledged that in the last century it has been advanced in the economy but still “remains to be done a lot”, starting to close the participation gap in the labor market of 22 percentage points, on average.
The Costa Rican economist highlighted the “great asymmetry, the injustice” in the economy of care in the region, one of the central themes of the conference opened Tuesday by Claudia Sheinbaum, the first woman president of Mexico.
Salazar said that, due to the aging of the population and the reduction of the fertility rate in Latin America, the demand for older adult care will be increasing, so ECLAC asked its members to allocate for that item up to 4.7% of its GDP at 2035.
To achieve these investments, up to 31 million jobs could be generated in 2035 in 23 countries in the region, 12% of their workforce, and increase tax revenues by 20%.
