Colombia has received US$5 billion in foreign investment so far this year, the country’s President Alvaro Uribe announced on Sunday.
The President praised Colombia’s capability to maintain the interest of foreign investors, despite the global financial crisis.
“In the second trimester of this year, despite the economic difficulties, investment rates of 25 and 26.5 percent were maintained. In the past, these investment rates had dropped to 14 percent,” the President stressed.
The President, still at home because of his swine flu infection, talked by phone to the country’s urban transport association.
Despite Uribe’s praise of his administration’s economic policy, the country’s Financial Minister recently announced foreign investment this year has fallen. His prognosis for 2009 was that total foreign investment would be fifteen percent lower than last year.
According to Uribe, it has been economic measures taken by the national government that made it possible to maintain the high investment rates, one of the economic pillars of Uribe’s administration.
“Without a high investment rate, without markets for Colombian opportunities, it is impossible to move forward and to overcome poverty,” the Head of State told the transporters.
