Caribbean & Central America
President-elect Martín Torrijos will seek membership of the Mercosur trading bloc when he comes to power on 1 September. That, at least, was the essence of Torrijos's message in Buenos Aires during the second leg of his four-day tour to the Southern Cone between 5 and 8 August.
Torrijos, who met Brazilian counterpart Lula da Silva, Argentina's Néstor Kirchner and Chile's Ricardo Lagos in addition to the president of Mercosur's political commission, Eduardo Duhalde, said that membership of Mercosur would complement Panama's expanding relations with the US. Panama is in the process of negotiating a free trade agreement with the US. 'Panama could be a centre of product distribution' Torrijos said.
Panama would dearly love to export more services (its strongest export) to the Mercosur region. Panama has a negative trade balance with Mercosur member countries. In the whole of 2003, it exported just US$300,000 of goods to Argentina, while importing US$55m worth of goods.
There is another reason for Panama's sudden interest in enlisting in Mercosur. An FTA with the US and closer ties with Mercosur would strengthen Panama City's bid to hold the headquarters of the Free Trade Area of the Americas. Panama is competing with the US cities of Miami, Houston and Atlanta; the Mexican cities of Cancún and Puebla; Port-of-Spain, Trinidad & Tobago, and San Juan, Puerto Rico.