Bolivian Leader Predicts Solution to Latin America's Energy Problems "Soon"
Posted on: Sunday, 27 January 2008, 12:00 CST
Text of report by government-owned Argentine news agency Telam
[Unattributed report "Evo Says Energy Problems To Be Solved Soon" - Telam Headline]
Buenos Aires, 25 January (Telam) -Bolivian President Evo Morales forecasted today that "the continent's energy issues will begin to be resolved in the short and medium term" and announced that he would promote a "tri-national" meeting with Presidents Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner of Argentina to "forestall problems this winter."
"The energy issue should be addressed without selfishness, regionalism, sectorism, or as an exclusively economic issue to make money. With agreements between our countries and accelerating investment by the state and the companies, the issue will gradually resolve itself," he said,
He added that three new oil wells were discovered in Bolivia last year, which will produce more than 800,000 cubic meters of gas daily.
"We will accelerate investments to construct the necessary pipelines and to be able to put the gas at the service of the regional market as soon as possible. That could be achieved in eight months to a year," he said.
He stressed the importance of the meeting with Lula and Cristina "to evaluate the production capacity and needs of each country and to gradually seek reciprocity and balance in the solutions."
He added that Bolivia was complying with all its contracts to supply gas to Brazil and he estimated that the service to Argentina would increase to the extent that "state, private, and mixed investment agreements advance."
Morales made these statements at noon today in a press conference in the Buenos Aires Sheraton Hotel after participating in a ceremony with President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner in the White Salon of Casa Rosada, in which the two leaders launched the North East Gas Pipeline tender.
Morales arrived in the country on a private plane at 0850 and planned to leave for Caracas to meet Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez after his official engagements.
Morales stressed the success of the nationalization process of his country's hydrocarbons' production and stated that "82 per cent of the utilities used to go to the companies and 18 per cent to the state and that is exactly the opposite now."
"They used to say that the companies would leave and that did not happen. They are still working normally and with new contracts," he said, highlighting the increase of private investment.
In this sense, he stated that "more than 1.3bn dollars in private investment is now underway and with recent commitments it will reach more than 1.5bn dollars this year."
He stressed that the biggest private investment in Bolivia, 600m dollars, was in 1998 and that it had stalled from then until his mandate.
"We stopped the carving of the Bolivian state oil company and today that company is investing another 200m dollars," he added.
"This is what will resolve the energy issue and we therefore invite the companies to invest in Bolivia and we tell them that they have the right to their utilities. However, we do not want landlords, but partners and we thus establish the rules."
Meanwhile, Morales reflected on Chavez in his integration project, indicating that it is materializing in the Bolivarian Alternative for the Peoples of our America [ALBA] bloc and he opined that that entity "should join Mercosur and the Andean Community of Nations [CAN] to seek a fair trade treaty."
He stated that "the Free Trade Area of the Americas [FTAA], which was a colonization project, was defeated" in Argentina and said that "now there are liberating democracies, no longer subjected to the empire, which seek something else."
He made a balance of his two years in office, highlighting as achievements the fiscal and trade surplus obtained, "after years of deficit," and the progress in redistribution of wealth and agrarian reform issues.
Originally published by Telam news agency, Buenos Aires, in Spanish 1750 25 Jan 08.
(c) 2008 BBC Monitoring Americas. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.
Source: BBC Monitoring Americas
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