Source:
IFIs Latin American Monitor
Mon Oct 19 2009
Leaders of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our Americas (ALBA) met on October 16 and 17 in Cochabamba, Bolivia. The meeting marked the seventh leaders’ summit for ALBA, now in its fifth year and with its name modified to swap "Alternative" for "Alliance" in June. At this meeting the leaders of the member countries – Antigua and Barbuda, Bolivia, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Venezuela – agreed on a new name for the SUCRE, that now stands for Sistema Único de Compensación Regional (Unified System of Regional Compensation), and signed its Constitutive Treaty.
They stated that the SUCRE will be used “as a tool for achieving monetary and financial sovereignty, eliminating dependence on the U.S. dollar in regional trade, reducing asymmetries and the gradual consolidation of an economic zone of shared development.” They also requested SUCRE Technical Committee to hold a meeting no later than mid-November, to discuss SUCRE Implementation Plan.
Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, and Ecuadorian President, Rafael Correa, will complement this initiative with the creation of an ALBA Reserves Fund in order to support development plans and fight against poverty in its member countries. The leaders also reiterated their determination to give greater force to the Trade Treaty of the Peoples (TPC) in order to increase trade among the nine members, and consolidate an option that competes with U.S. and European free trade agreements.
Related information:
-> New ALBA trading currency dawns at Bolivia Summit
-> Statement of the Cochacamba's Summits at Bolivia Summit (in Spanish language)
-> ALBA Summit: Caricom members enter reservations on Sucre, Defence Council
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