Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said that Beijing is willing to negotiate step by step, a free trade agreements with Uruguay and other countries in South America, particularly members of Mercosur.
Argentina and China signed a historic agreement that opens the huge Asian market to beef and lamb with bone from the South American country, according to Senasa the Argentine agriculture and livestock sanitary office. The deal concludes fifteen years of negotiations and means access to the world's largest importer of beef.
The European Commission and Mercosur are planning to resume negotiations to reach a new Association Agreement during this month. The Commissioner of the European Trade Commission, Cecilia Malmström, stated that, after the last negotiating round, which took place in early December, and after the attempt to reach an agreement in the framework of the last round of the World Trade Organization (WTO), held from 11 to 14 December, the agreement was very close and would be reached in a matter of weeks.
An outbreak of brucellosis at the Veterinary School of the Asunción University in Paraguay, FCV-UNA, has cost the academic center its international certification, and has become a shameful experience for a country which is among the top world beef exporters.
Merval, the benchmark stock market index in Argentina, rose 0.25% to 29,260.33 on Wednesday, reflecting investor optimism that the Senate would pass the 2018 budget and a tax reform. It was the seventh consecutive increase of the index.
Argentina's state-owned oil company YPF will pay US$ 114 million to Transportadora de Gas del Mercosur (TGM) to end a conflict that began in 2009 when the company suspended the shipment of natural gas.
Brazil maintains that the settlement of the Guyana/Venezuela Border is final and must be respected, according to the country's Foreign Minister Carl Greenidge. Following his attendance at the recently concluded Mercosur Summit held in Brazil, Greenidge said Brasilia has been updated on Venezuela’s contention that the 1899 Award is null and void, and remains resolute to its original position.
Brazil said it was suspending fish exports to the European Union in response to concerns raised by Brussels' veterinary inspectors. The move was aimed at preventing the EU itself from ordering a suspension, said Luis Rangel, the secretary of state in charge of fisheries.
Credit risk rating agency Moody's expects Argentina's economic recovery to continue in 2018 and 2019, helped by the reforms advanced by the Mauricio Macri's administration in the last two years.
The National Constituent Assembly (ANC in Spanish) recommended to the Public Prosecutor and the Judicial Branch to release more than 80 political prisoners. At the moment, 13 of them have been released with precautionary measures.