MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Paraguayan President discusses energy and business with Chubut Governor

Torres and Peña met at the latter's Presidential residence in Asunción

Paraguay's President Santiago Peña met Tuesday with Ignacio Torres, Governor of the Argentine Patagonian Province of Chubut, at the Mburuvicha Roga Residence in Asunción to discuss bilateral issues. The Argentine official also held encounters with local businessmen.

 “I received the pleasant visit of Ignacio Agustín Torres, governor of the province of Chubut, Argentina. During our meeting, we talked about the challenges and opportunities we share in the region and agreed on the importance of working together to build a future with more opportunities for our people. Cooperation and dialogue are essential to promote progress and development,” Peña wrote on X.

Among the main topics under review were the exports of fishing products in addition to renewable energies, with a possible link between the Paraguayan hydroelectric grid and Chubut's wind-generated plants.

Torres and Peña also signed a cooperation agreement on the sustainable management of water resources, joint energy planning, and climate change mitigation. They also agreed to discuss the agreements currently in force between Argentina and Paraguay to speed up judiciary procedures through digitalization and cut down bureaucratic times.

The Patagonian Governor also met with dignitaries of Paraguay's oil company Petróleos Paraguayos (Petropar) including CEO Eddie Jara Rojas, as well as with other government officials to “learn about” the tax relief model applied in that country. “We are going to replicate in Chubut a management model of tax relief and tax simplification,” said Torres. “This is definitely the path we are going to follow,” he added. Paraguay has significantly improved its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in recent years, based on an efficient administration of public resources.

“We are pleased to meet with a country that, in administrative terms and in terms of efficiency and institutional transparency, has a lot to do with Chubut,” Torres insisted. “Paraguay is the example that, with clear policies and a good use of public resources, it is possible to build a scenario of low inflation, low public debt, and high investment,” he also pointed out.

“In our province, we have been able to deactivate the financial bomb that the previous government bequeathed us and thanks to the careful planning of public policies, investments have increased in the last months,” Torres stressed.

“In the last few months, Chubut has been in the news for very good things, and in many of them we agree on how a State should be run: With austerity, fiscal relief, and reorganizing a positive scheme that allows maximizing investments,” insisted the provincial leader.

The meeting with Peña “was very productive and allowed us to strengthen the link between Chubut and Paraguay, under the premise that a State must accompany the growth and development of society,” he also noted.

“A State that accompanies and manages resources well is the guarantee to attract new investments, that is why we are pleased to twin ties with Paraguay and to continue developing a tax relief scheme that favors the arrival of new investments, for the benefit of all the people of Chubut,” he went on.