The Minister of the Interior, Eduardo “Wado” de Pedro, and the governors of the Norte Grande region closed their tour of the United Stateswhich lasted five days in the cities of Washington and New York, where they met with executives from leading companies, representatives of multilateral credit organizations and political officials, with the purpose of attracting investments for productive and infrastructure development in the zone.
After four days of negotiations in Washingtonthe tour ended in New York with a meeting at the Council of the Americas headed by its president and CEO, Susan Segal, and De Pedro, in which the governors exposed the potential of the region before owners and general managers of member companies of the entity with operations in Argentina and Latin America.
“All the decisions that are made in the government of President Alberto Fernández are made with a federal spirit, a spirit that has to do with recomposing asymmetries that exist in our territory,” said de Pedro, who said that the cabinet of ministers “is at the disposal of each of the strategic decisions, of each of the investment proposals” made by the governors.
He also stressed that the recent tour of the US by the Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, “opened doors and resolved some discussions that will allow us to obtain financing for some infrastructure works that are essential for the development of northern Argentina,” such as ” the Puna gas pipelines that are needed to boost lithium production, and the bi-oceanic corridors that allow improving competitiveness.
De Pedro marked as the axis of the growth possibilities that are opening up not only for the Norte Grandebut for all of Argentina, the exploitation of the Vaca Muerta deposit, which, he estimated, “will allow in the coming years to correct the balance of payments” and “face external restrictions by adding more than 30 billion dollars per year” and transform the country into an exporter of energy.
The federal decisions of the national government are to recompose asymmetries that exist in our country. It is essential to have infrastructure works for the development of the Norte Grande that improve competitiveness and quality of life, that generate employment, roots and productivity. pic.twitter.com/gR2gtng918
– Wado de Pedro ?? (@wadodecorrido) September 30, 2022
To its turn, the governor of Santiago del Estero, Gerardo Zamorain his capacity as pro tempore president of the Norte Grande Regional Council, thanked the national government for accompanying the agenda promoted from the region, while highlighting the great territorial capacity, the variety of climates and the production of minerals strategic resources and food that the Norte Grande can contribute to the world.
The provincial president specified that the projects promoted from the Norte Grande together with the national government “involve a significant investment of 30,000 million dollars”, of which “20,000 million dollars in the next 15 years will be to generate the necessary infrastructure both road, rail and river that would allow us to generate access to the Pacific”.
When you open the meeting, Segal pointed out that “we have an important agenda, which is to discuss the enormous potential that the Norte Grande region presents for the development of Argentina”, while the Argentine ambassador in Washington, Jorge Argüello, welcomed the visit and assessed that the tour “is coming out very well”, for which when the governors return “we can say that the mission has been accomplished”.
In the afternoon, the official delegation toured the United Nations headquarters in New York accompanied by Maria del Carmen SqueffArgentine ambassador to the United Nations, and spoke with authorities of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) on regional investments.
The mission ended with a networking event at the Argentine Consulate with investors, scientists, importers and distributors of Argentine products.
The provincial leaders participated in the tour 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) and Gustavo Sáenz (Salta ), the lieutenant governor of Tucumán, Regino Amado, and a representative of the president of Corrientes, Gustavo Valdés.
Traveling with De Pedro were the head of the National Directorate of Migration (DNM), Florencia Carignano; the National Electoral Director, Marcos Schiavi, and the Secretary General of the Federal Investment Council (CFI), Ignacio Lamothe, while the US ambassador in Buenos Aires, Marc Stanley, and Argüello, his Argentine counterpart in Washington, accompanied the mission.
This will be the first of three visits scheduled by the governors to the United States, which will continue next year with those of Patagonia and another with the provinces of the center of the country, as reported.
The previous one headed by De Pedro was with provincial leaders when he went to Israel, last April, and consisted of a scientific-technological cooperation mission on water management in that country.
During the tour, the members of the delegation met with authorities from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB); from the World Bank (WB); of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), and the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF), and spoke to executives of more than 30 leading companies in the United States about investment possibilities in the Norte Grande.
In addition, the governors held meetings with directors of the Microsoft company, where they advanced agreements to coordinate technological investments in rural areas; and the Space X aerospace company, owned by Elon Musk, with a focus on the possibility of developing the potential of SMEs in the provinces to join the value chains of this high-tech sector.
For his part, the interior minister met with political officials such as assistant to the president Joe Biden and director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, Julie Chávez Rodríguez; the Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs of the Department of State, Rena Bitter, and with representatives of the American Jewish Committee and the World Jewish Congress, among other activities.
