With responsible policy management, Latin American governments can use industrial clusters to shift from over-reliance on commodity production to more value-added sectors.
What can Latin America and the Caribbean gain from cluster formation and development?
Can Latin America harness its cities for growth?
In the most urbanized region in the world, Latin American policymakers need to ensure urbanization goes hand in hand with development.
What happened to Chinese development projects in Latin America?
For years, concern has mounted over the growing economic influence of China in the region, but investment is comparatively small and not a single major infrastructure project has come to fruition.
Universal Basic Income: An alternative path to development?
Providing a fixed, unconditional income to the poor seems a radical idea. But it’s gaining traction. Could it work in Central America?
Central American integration: it’s about the practical issues
Climbing out of the commodities trap and building inclusive economies will require establishing a substantive, coordinated regional policy on integration, investment, immigration, and policy reform.
Civil society is confronting difficult times… and silence
Latin America has gone global, but not just in its trade and diplomacy. A growing number of governments are copying from autocrats around the world how to restrict democratic civil society. Sadly, democrats in the region have been slow to react.
China goes global with development banks
In just over a decade, China has become a global leader in development finance. China has established a number of bilateral and multilateral funds across the world, in addition to two policy banks. China has also led efforts to establish new multilateral development banks that promise to provide significant financing capabilities into the regime as well.
Beyond the Zapata scandal: outsourcing Bolivia’s national development to China
Personal contacts and questionable contracts between the government and the Chinese company CAMC Engineering reveal both the problems with public procurement in Bolivia and how far Chinese companies have advanced in the country.
Everybody loves infrastructure
Latin America invests about 2% of GDP on infrastructure. Between 1992 and 2011 China invested an average of 8.5% of GDP in infrastructure per year. Given the demonstrated effects of infrastructure on development and poverty reduction, it’s time for the region to make a concerted effort to attract foreign investors.
Doing business in Cuba–don’t forget opportunity costs
The new, the exotic, the previously forbidden fruit may appear to be the most tantalizing, but objective criteria should form the realist metric on which to measure all business decisions. The incremental and marginal changes in trade with Cuba are just that—incremental and marginal.
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