The Minister of the Interior, Eduardo De Pedro, and the governors of the Norte Grande organized this week a five-day tour of the United States that they described as “auspicious and fruitful,” during which they met with representatives of leading companies, multilateral credit organizations and officials looking for investment.
De Pedro traveled with the governors Gerardo Zamora (Santiago del Estero), Gildo Insfrán (Formosa), Ricardo Quintela (La Rioja), Raúl Jalil (Catamarca), Oscar Herrera Ahuad (Misiones), Gerardo Morales (Jujuy), Jorge Capitanich ( Chaco), Gustavo Sáenz (Salta) and the vice president of the Legislature of Tucumán, Regino Amado.
As part of the delegation, the National Director of Migration, Florencia Carignano, the president of the Federal Investment Council (CFI), Ignacio Lamothe, and the national electoral director, Marcos Schiavi, were also represented by the Ministry of the Interior, while in Washington they joined the Argentine ambassador to the United States, Jorge Argüello, and his American counterpart in Argentina, Marc Stanley.
Argüello told Télam that the tour “in general terms was a political success” because “the objective proposed with the group of governors grouped in the Argentine Norte Grande has been completely fulfilled.”
“This action takes place within the framework of the Federal Agenda Program of the Argentine embassy in Washington, which began four months ago, in coordination with the plenary session of the governors, and which has been satisfactorily fulfilled,” the diplomat summarized.
Along these lines, he stressed that “the Minister of the Interior, who is the federal government official who coordinates with the provinces, and the support of the CFI participated in all the activities.”
In one of his presentations in the United States, De Pedro ratified that the government of President Alberto Fernández is “totally committed” to federalism and stressed that “all the decisions that are made” are made with “that federal spirit that has to do with recompose the asymmetries that exist in Argentina” between its various regions.
For his part, Lamothe described the mission as “historic” because, he stressed, “it was about ten Argentine provinces of different political persuasions asking the multilateral credit organizations, the investment funds, the main institutions that are in Washington concrete solutions”.
And, he noted that the next step will be to create agreements with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank, the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).
In this sense, Zamora promised, as president pro tempore of the Norte Grande, to work on an agenda with the UNDP and the CFI for the works requested by the provinces of the North as a region and in a particular way.
Argüello specified that the delegation made “contact with authorities of the United States Government, the White House, the Departments of State, Energy, Commerce and Agriculture” and precisely “with multilateral credit organizations such as the IDB, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund”.
The diplomat explained that the regional administrations already have agreements with these latter entities “and what they seek is to expand credit alternatives, always oriented towards infrastructure works in the provinces and channels that facilitate the export of their producers.”
In the mission “in all cases the objective has been the same, to promote exports from regional economies and promote investments in Argentine provinces,” said Argüello, adding that the governors “return with many new contacts and lines of work to develop “, because “the interesting thing about this is that each of the provinces will have their own missions, due to the bunch of contacts they have.”
For example, Capitanich announced that the sportswear and shoe firm New Balance -in an association with the Chaco company Punto Medio- will settle in the industrial park of Puerto Tirol and will start with two production lines next February, in a 4,000 square meters and which will involve the gradual incorporation of 250 employees.
Jujuy Morales said that the mission represented “the commitment of the governors of the Great North to bring to the United States, for the first time in a joint and consensual manner, a master plan for investment in productive infrastructure for 30,000 million dollars to be executed in 15 years. “, with “a view to solving the structural problems of the region and the country.”
Quintela, from La Rioja, summed up this trip that “the Norte Grande has been established as a region to go out into the world, first to make itself known, to know that the North of our country exists” and, “fundamentally, to offer the opportunities that our provinces offer to the whole world”.
Argüello also mentioned that meetings were held on the tour “at the Chamber of Commerce, at the Council in New York” and “dozens of meetings with US companies that work with Argentina, with investors that invest or plan to invest in Argentina.”
The ambassador highlighted “the networking with importers and distributors of Argentine products to the United States, the UNDP Program at the UN in New York and visits to important companies such as Amazon and Space X.”
He also mentioned “the first action, with Think Tanks”, which he described as “very rich” because he was interested “especially in verifying the meeting of each governor with the think tanks, which permanently organize activities, to make known the potential of their provinces”.
The assassination attempt against Vice President Cristina Fernández, which is a month old this Saturday, was also the subject of conversations in the United States.
The US Department of Security reiterated, in a meeting that De Pedro and Argüello held in Washington with Alejandro Mayorkas, head of that organization, what was transmitted days ago to Minister Aníbal Fernández at the meeting at the United Nations Organization, in which the The US government offered collaboration to work on clarifying the incident.
In addition, the representatives of the American Jewish Committee and the World Jewish Congress expressed their solidarity with the Vice President, through a meeting they held in New York with De Pedro, Argüello, Jalil and Carignano.
“The two meetings began with individual condemnations of the assassination attempt and transmitting solidarity,” Argüello pointed out, adding that “Mayortas not only condemned the attack on the Vice President, but also offered all the logistics and showed all the willingness that was needed in the investigation for attempted assassination.
Regarding Stanley’s presence on the tour, he said: “When I organize actions in the United States with Argentine political actors, in the host country’s agenda I usually invite the ambassador” and added that “Stanley accepted my invitation and participated in meetings with US federal government officials.
Argüello announced the completion of the second mission by the end of the year, with the provinces of the Central Region: Entre Ríos, Córdoba and Santa Fe, and the Patagonian provinces.
“We have been talking with the governors for Phase 2 of the Federal Agenda, to do it in December,” said Argüello, while the third mission will be held next year, with the remaining provinces.
That Agenda, he affirmed, “has been being implemented for a year and a half, first virtually, with two-hour meetings between the governors and their cabinet with the ambassador and their officials, to work and coordinate actions,” and he referred that “overcoming of the pandemic allows attendance”.
