MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Petro announces Colombia will renegotiate FTA with US

For Petro, wealth is not in extraction, but in production (Pic EFE)

Colombian President Gustavo Petro Urrego announced Wednesday that his country had started renegotiating with the United States the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the two countries in force for the past eleven years.

”I want to publicly announce that the renegotiation (of the FTA) has begun,“ said Petro, who said his decision was based on the alleged disadvantages for Colombia as a result of such a deal.

”If I wanted to replace that corn with Colombian corn, I would have 1,200,000 more jobs, that is, wealth. Why can't I do it? Because the Free Trade Agreement with the United States, which was signed a few years ago, forbids it,“ he said.

For Petro, wealth is not in extraction, but in production, and what is being experienced at the moment is the crisis of the extraction model. Hence, he said he believed that the renegotiation of the FTA is one of the pillars for the return to a productive model meaning the industrialization of agriculture.

”If we are going to industrialize, we need knowledge, that means strengthening the public university, one of the priority axes of this government,” Petro also explained about one of his main campaign slogans.

The Colombian-American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham Colombia) has pointed out that the FTA has allowed an increase in trade between the two countries with 11,497 Colombian products having zero tariff access to the US, compared to 5,500 items a decade ago.

The US has also been the main foreign investor in Colombia in mining; manufacturing; finance, professional, scientific, and technical services; wholesale trade; information systems; electrical products and computers; and electrical equipment and accessories.