MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Lacalle announces free trade zone coming up in Uruguayan department of Maldonado

Lacalle said his government was open to investment of all sizes.

Uruguayan President Luis Lacalle Pou announced Thursday in La Capuera that plans were underway to create a free trade zone in the department of Maldonado.

Lacalle also confirmed he had signed on Wednesday signed “a free zone from the past government,” consisting of “a couple of towers in Punta del Este, basically offices,“ he added.

The President insisted that the new free zone will be more comprehensive, with people from audiovisual, health, technological and logistics sectors already interested. ”We are going to make the interested parties propose as comprehensive as possible to generate a strong demand for work,“ Lacalle vowed as he pointed out that the government was out “investments of all sizes.”

Lacalle also announced that ”we have in the portfolio around US $ 1.5 billion through Comap (Investment Law Enforcement Commission), which would generate manpower, more than 5,000 jobs,“ he said.

Regarding anticovid measures, Lacalle explained that ”you hear a lot of people who want the government to decree a mandatory quarantine, to lower the curtain for three weeks, and not do anything for a while; then there are people who are asking the government to open cultural activities and others because they have to live. In that balance, we try to move.“

He also underlined that vaccination “has been accelerated.” He foresaw that by mid-July it is expected to reach 2 million doses of second doses to Uruguayans. ”Let's hope we can open the tap a little more there,” he said.