Brazil would be the second country to buy electricity generated by Bolivia in the region.
Bolivia is looking forward to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s third term in Brazil, not only for the boost it could give to accelerate its entry into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur), but also because it aims to to reactivate various projects, including electricity exports.
After assuming his mandate, Lula received several presidents and heads of state on January 1, including Bolivian President Luis Arce Catacora, with whom they discussed a broad agenda of issues that are not only of bilateral interest but concern the entire region.
According to Bolivia’s Deputy Minister for Foreign Trade and Integration, Benjamín Blanco, the appointment marks a “new milestone in Bolivia-Brazil relations”, which has a long history.
He even said that “Lula’s inauguration fills us with hope that there will be more social justice in this country.”
With a population of more than 214 million people and a total area of 8,514,215 square kilometers, Brazil is part of BIRCS – an acronym for collectively designating Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – the business and trade association of the five emerging economies that were the most promising in the world in the 2000s.
In this sense, Bolivia sees “unique commercial” opportunities in Brazil because of the high purchasing power of its population, Blanco said.
Recalling that “Bolivia has an economic supplemental agreement with Mercosur countries, without tariffs, to be able to sell to these countries,” the agency expressed interest in Lula helping to complete the legislative process for Bolivia’s full accession to realize this block.
Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay have already completed the process of Bolivia joining Mercosur, which began a decade ago.
Although the axis of Bolivian exports to Brazil is gas, the Deputy Minister assured that in the following years trade exchanges will be diversified, as will the subjects of common interest. There he mentioned the execution of the Bi-Oceanic Integration Rail Corridor, which will unite the Pacific and the Atlantic.
“There are several commercial initiatives ranging from being able to sell electricity and other manufactured products like urea, among other things,” he said.
Brazil would be the second country to buy electricity generated by Bolivia in the region. The first will be Argentina, whose supply deal is in its final stages with only executive approval from both countries remaining and could be finalized by the end of this month.
According to the Ministry of Hydrocarbons and Energy, Bolivia’s installed power generation capacity is 3,822 megawatts (MW), while demand in October 2002 reached 1,601 MW.
Post views: 0