El Periodico (Guatemala)
April 29, 2002
By Hernan Guerra B.

Florencio Salazar is the general coordinator of the PPP, comissioned by the Fox administration. According to the mexican functionary, the maquiladoras represent a fountain of employment. Although they meet an immediate need, they are volatile and only look to pay low wages. With the plan, he believes that the area will offer investors qualified workers in order to depend less on this sector.

More than constructing highways and interconnected electrical grids, what more will be included within the PPP?

It is not only this. The plan includes 8 basic initiatives: to facilitate trade, to assure sustainable growth, to promote tourism, to be prepared to attend to possible natural disasters, to modernize roadways and telecommunications, create an interconnection of electrical grids, and to train the workforce human development. The objective is to better living conditions of the population of the region which is caracterized by high rates of marginalization.

But until now, concrete actions have been rather limited, or is it that they are not known?

The plan has gone from an agreement to action. We are on the verge of the electrical interconnection through the region. At the same time, the PPP relies on $320 million dollar financing offered by the Spanish Government and the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB). With the exception of Guatemala and El Salvador, the rest of the governments have signed the credit agreement.

When will they begin the projects?

This year. The interconnection we are hoping is finished in 2003. The project will be the detonator of the rest of the PPP. Continuing, the road network will include a highway that will go from Puebla, passing through Oaxaca and Chiapas until Guatemala. Then it would run along the Pacific until Panama. The second major roadway will go from the Atlantic, along the Gulf of Mexico in the Yucatan Pennisula until Honduras. Then it will pass by the Pacific finally ending in Panama. At the same time, there will be a number of complementary roadways. With all of this, we are looking to facilitate the movement of goods and people in all of the area. In order to improve the conditions of the population, there are plans of long distance education, training in technology and health. I insist that the ultimate objective is that the people have opportunities to increase there income.

Will these actions be sufficient? In what state does judicial and political stability for countries like Guatemala stand?

Investment has not arrived where conditions are not made possible for positive economic activities. We feel that by constructing infrastructure we will be promoting investment. It is obvious that parallel to this the governments have to train for a qualified workforce, but not for the same countries to compete between each other to see who pays less. The conditions have to be equal for all.

But in this sense, Southern Mexico would have the most to gain, because the government has many more resources than the rest of Central America - A group of international banks and cooperation agencies already organized a 4 billion dollar purse. These resources will be available for all the organizations that want to invest in the Plan.

But there are countries whose debt capacity is limited?

In order to discuss this, the presidents of Central America and Mexico will meet the 27th and 28th of July in the Yucatan. Also, we will analize the level of advancement of the initiatives for the country. There also, will be present, in detail, all of the projects.

By having such expensive projects, public support will be inevitable - We would prefer that the outside investment was totally private. Not withstanding, for roadways, the recapitalization of the companies is slow. Then, we have to break from this vicious cycle of public investment. Justifiable, it is the bottleneck of the plan, but we hope that this problem will be resolved by the presidents at the Cumbre in Yucatan.

Would it be with investment from a variety of sources?

No so much so. What we are looking to do is to get financing at low interests rates for the long term. At the same time, understand alternative options to better involve the private sector. For example, the constructive projects by the State would be concessioned to change from rent pay. The analysis will be the job of the IADB and specialized technisions.

The 4 billion dollars, is this the estimated cost of the Plan or only part of the initial contribution? It is an estimate of a technical study.

What productive sectors will be able to have the most influence over the platform of the Plan?

Ranching, industrial agriculture, natural resource extraction, fishing, and trade. It is important to us to generate opportunities for everlasting employment over time, not like what is occuring with maquiladoras, that only pay low salaries or an exoneration of taxes. With the maquiladoras it is demonstrative that it does not have long term permanence because they are weak and volatile. Unfortunately, you have to say that a worse salary is one that does not exist. In that sense, the maquiladoras are solutions, although very modest and temporal. But in order to redirect these opportunities, we aspire for investment in the assembly of vehicles and electronics, where the technology will be the base.

How long will it take to have the first results?

Five years

You don't believe that period of time is too short?

Yes, but in reality the Plan has generated large expectations at the international level. Many developed countries have offered there help. We have to take advantage of this.

Tell me, why is President Vicente Fox looking to develop Southern Mexico together with Central America?

Because we share culture, land, traditions, and common problems.The problems know no borders. There are strong migratory currents from Central America to Mexico and from Mexico toward the north. This phenomenon was created due to a lack of internal opportunities.