From May 12th to May 18th, the fourth round of negotiations between the full members of the Pacific Alliance (Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru) and the candidates to become associate countries (Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Singapore) will take place. Market access, trade defence, trade facilitation and public procurement are among the key aspects of the negotiation.
The Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism of Colombia, María Lorena Gutiérrez, explained that the objective is to finish with the negotiations by July of this year, when the XIII Presidential Summit of the bloc will take place. Thus, participants will be able to decide on the acceptance of these new countries in the Alliance.
In the third round, which was held last March in Chile, the countries successfully negotiated on cooperation issues, SMEs and regulatory improvement in three of the 23 technical roundtables.
This time the focus will be on the technical roundtables on market access; trade defence; rules of origin; trade facilitation; technical barriers to trade; public procurement; cross-border trade in services; investment; financial services; e-commerce; labor; competition and state companies, among others.