Central America Inks
Customs Union
Representatives of
Guatemala, El Salvador,
Honduras, Nicaragua and
Costa Rica agreed in
this capital on the
rules to form the
Central American Customs
Union.
The architects of this
joint trade policy
decided each nation will
maintain autonomy as
long as the document is
not in force, to be
signed by the area's
presidents at the 31st
meeting of the Central
American Integration
System (SICA).
The customs union is one
of the requirements of
the European Union to
continue the
negotiations started in
October for an
Association Agreement or
bilateral accord with
the region, reported
Prensa Libre daily.
The following step to
its enforcement will be
the homologation of
trade strategies of each
country, which may imply
for example, to
establish similar taxes
on imported products.
The deputy ministers of
Economy and Trade of the
nations involved in the
integration project also
agreed to determine the
way in which the entry
taxes to this market of
42 million consumers
will be collected.
Guatemalan deputy
minister of Economy,
Enrique Lacs, also
explained that each
country will determine
the sanitary measures it
will apply to foreign
products.
They are currently
working on a ruling to
homologate and regulate
plague and disease
control, he commented.
Costa Rica´s deputy
minister of Foreign
Trade, Amparo Pacheco,
confirmed they achieved
consensus "but that does
not imply that customs
integration will
immediately begin de
operate," she said.
The officials of both
sectors exchanged points
of view the eve as part
of the preparation for
the meeting of heads of
state and governments of
SICA. |
|
