Santiago Peña, 46 years old, assumed the presidency of Paraguay on August 15 and although he is considered a newcomer to politics, he is an
economist who completed his training at Columbia University
in the United States.
Peña, whose mother is Argentine, was an official and later president of the Central Bank of Paraguay and even served
at the IMF.
Tonight Peña shares a dinner with the 150 businessmen and entrepreneurs participating in the Llao Llao Forum. He arrived today at 8:30 p.m. and spoke with journalists.
- There were concerns from Paraguay regarding Argentina's debt in Yacyretá. Is the claim still going?
-Yacyretá is a great binational undertaking that Paraguay has with Argentina and this is a long story, it has had moments of great happiness such as the completion after 30 years of starting the project. There were moments of great sadness where we had difficult times and today we are somehow going through this impasse that is actually affecting the entire Argentine electrical system with delays in payments and this is also affecting the payment that the Cammesa company has to make. , which is the distributor, which, since it does not receive payments in Argentina, cannot pay. We understand the Argentine situation and we are patient.
-How much is the Argentine debt in Yacyretá?
-A US$ 200 million
-In Argentina, President Milei proposes dollarization. What does he think?
- Using the dollar as currency is a risk that leaves the country defenseless against external shocks, Paraguay has built monetary strength, we have an independent Central Bank, a very prudent fiscal policy with debt levels that are at the lowest levels of Latin America, then from the perspective of a Paraguayan economist, as is my case, dollarization does not make sense in our case.
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And in Argentina?
-We cannot deny that in other countries and in the case of Argentina, having an anchor, as they say, a nominal anchor, a real anchor, a strong currency can help, convertibility helped at the time after many years of monetary instability in the 90s. So it should not be ruled out, but this is obviously a very particular consideration of Argentina and the vision it has. But we economists always defend the currency, which is a great tool to be able to absorb external shocks because finally if the United States gains competitiveness and its dollar appreciates, one would not want that appreciation to end up affecting the country's own export sector, so what happens? does? The currency is devalued so as not to lose that competitiveness, so I do not particularly believe in dollarization because our experience is totally different, but it is valid for other countries.
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And a regional currency?
-Under no circumstances and in the case of Paraguay with the longest-lived currency in South America, I think it makes no sense.
-What is happening in security on the triple border?
-The world has globalized and criminal groups have also globalized and many times governments do not organize within our countries and we do not integrate and coordinate at the regional level. I have proposed frontal work on internal security. Three months after taking office on August 15 of last year, we carried out a security operation never seen before, we took control of one of the 10 most dangerous prisons in the world, the Tacumbú prison on December 18.
-How do you feel in Mercosur?
-I am a fan of Mercosur, I believe in integration, this is the neighborhood we are in, we cannot move so the best thing is to get along with our neighbors. It has been a difficult relationship with two very large countries, Brazil and Argentina, but I am convinced that together we will always be better than apart. If we look at the integration processes at a global level, today the processes are block negotiations, they are very Obviously, few countries like the United States and China can afford to be alone. But then there are regions, the European Union, Southeast Asia, the Central American countries, all move based on trade blocs and I believe that we will always have greater strength if we negotiate as a bloc. I do believe that Mercosur for a long time focused on this process of global integration in the free trade agreement between Mercosur and the European Union. More than 25 years have passed and I have been very critical of this in saying that Mercosur can no longer wait. Mercosur is the region of the world that has the greatest potential, if we think of a world that needs food, energy, young people, water, we have all of this.
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You got angry with Alberto Fernández over the Hidrovía toll, how is that issue in your relationship with Milei?
-Today the dialogue is much more fluid. In fact, I said that at the United Nations Assembly we had a meeting at the reception given by the president of the United States, Joe Biden, and I approached, very smiling, and Milei was quite upset with the complaint, with the voice that we had raised where we We said that the collection of a toll is valid but according to an international treaty it has to be agreed upon by all countries and that had not been the case. Argentina made that unilateral decision. We had a small exchange there but it didn't go beyond that, then we met again and gave each other a warm hug. Today the circumstances are totally different. There was a meeting a few days ago in Buenos Aires where all the representatives of the Hidrovía met and we are moving forward. I think there is a lot of optimism on the Paraguayan side. We see with optimism that Argentina has made the decision to rely on the experience of the US government's engineering corps. Paraguay did so with the technical group that has designed and maintains the Mississippi, which is one of the most important canals and that has been largely responsible for the development of the central part of the United States so we see with optimism, we believe that the Hidrovía is a great highway that is underused and of course for Paraguay as a Mediterranean country it is our exit to the sea and world trade and We are betting on that integration process.
-What expectations do you have from the meeting with businessmen? What is your message?
-The message is that we have to relaunch integration and businessmen have a great responsibility beyond the efforts that we presidents can make to generate the conditions, integration often involves a state of mind that businessmen must have to undertake. , to dare to have the audacity and well, Paraguay has been working for several years on this process of economic opening of macroeconomic stability and obviously we are very interested in Paraguay continuing to be an increasingly important destination for investments in the region. Paraguay is today the third largest exporter in the world of soybeans, the ninth largest exporter of meat, and we want to continue growing in this model, not only in agriculture but also in a process of logistical integration of the Waterway, the bi-oceanic corridor that is the closest canal to cross the Atlantic to the Pacific and our geographical centrality today offers a great opportunity and we want to become a digital and technological hub based on connectivity uniting the Pacific with the Atlantic. Paraguay also has an abundance of electrical energy. It is practically the only country in the world that today has 2.5 gigawatts of available energy that we sell to our two partners in Brazil and Argentina.
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You are one of the 11 countries in the world that has a relationship with Taiwan. How does China take it?
-We have the privilege in the sense that Paraguay still maintains a diplomatic relationship with Taiwan. We do not stop having commercial relations with popular China with its gigantic weight and it is probably the economy that demands the most from our economies that are mainly producers of raw materials, but we have a vision of how China also generates great economic dependence and that is a model in which Paraguay should be very careful, a small country in the context of nations but with a very diversified market in terms of the sale of its products but we cannot ignore that it is a very important power.