Business with Latin America

Business

Trade

Investment and Joint Ventures

Focus-LAC programme

PTA with Mercosur and Chile

Lines of Credit

Development Partnership

DTAA

BIPA

Business Practices

Guide for Business with Argentina, Uruguay and paraguay -click

Trade

India´s trade with Latin America in 2009

India´s exports to the region went down by about 30 percent in 2009 in comparison to 2008, while the imports declined marginally to 9.2 bilion from 9.7 billion dollars. This was expected, after the global crisis and local import restrictions by the governments which wanted to protect domestic industries and minimise outflow of foreign exchange.

Below are the trade figures in Million US dollars in 2009

	India’s exports	India´s Imports
Brazil	2191	3415
Mexico	1140	1085
Argentina	342	876
Colombia	504	449
Chile	278	908
Venezuela	213	2260
Peru	304	108
Uruguay	48	11
Paraguay	51	56
Ecuador	89	10
Costa Rica	47	29
Panama	25	5
Bolvia	31	3
El Salvador	33	3
Honduras	95	2
Nicaragua	91	11
Guatemala	87	19

India´s trade with Latin America increases by 45% in 2008.

India´s trade with Latin America in 2008 was 17.2 billion dollars, of which exports were 7.5 billion dollars and imports 9.7 billion dollars.

The trade has increased by 45% from 2007 when the trade was 11 billion dollars. India´s exports have increased by 40% from 5 billion dollars in 2007. Increase in imports in 2008 was 33% from 6 billion dollars in 2007.

Following are the 2008 figures

Country	India’s Exports (2008)	India’s Imports (2008)
Brazil	3564	1102
Mexico	1363	1587
Argentina	492	836
Chile	478	1744
Venezuela	195	3700
Colombia	529	16
Peru	504	281
Ecuador	125	12
Panama
Uruguay	75	8.5
Costa Rica	50	25
Honduras	56	3
Cuba
Dominican Republic
El Salvador
Nicaragua
Paraguay	59	38
Total	7422	9740

Major trade partners

Brazil was the top destination of India´s exports with 3.56 billio dollars follwed by Mexico, Peru, Chile, Colombia and Argentina.

Main source of imports were Venezuela, Chile, Mexico, Brazil and Argentina.

(Figures in USD million)

Country	India’s Imports									India's exports
Country	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008		2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008

Brazil	217	285	654	553	662	1137	937	958	1102		271	543	573	486	556	1203	1470	2200	3564
Mexico	60	160	316	474	454	522	671	868	1587		288	392	459	564	871	957	1125	1127	1363
Argentina	442	446	404	558	567	739	929	859	836		143	151	85	136	160	261	303	384	492
Chile	125	118	180	222	426	493	1489	2211	1744		70	75	82	71	100	134	164	208	478
colombia	3	3	3	6	7	5	64	80	16		65	73	88	131	181	248	346	476	529
Peru	35	37	22	19	50	79	102	210	281		30	45	63	60	76	122	146	252	504
Venezuela	150	254	140	4	10	35	850	489	3700		32	49	29	25	51	98	131	95	195

The above trade figures are for Jan- Dec periods. These have been obtained from embassies and online sources.

Composition of trade

The number one item of India´s exports to Latin America is Chemicals including bulk drugs. The other major items are engineering products such as autoparts, two wheelers,and equpments and machinery, textiles, pharmaceuticals,

Of the 3564 milion dollars of exports to Brazil, 40% were diesel oil exported by Reliance.

The major items of imports are crude oil, copper, soy oil, minerals, precious and semi precious stones, agroproducts, leather, wool, metal scape, wood.

A major portion of India´s imports in 2008 was crude oil imported by Reliance and Essar from Venezuela, Mexico, Brazil and Ecuador. Soy oil is sourced mostly from Argentina while most of copper comes from Chile.

India has sold 7 helicopters to Ecuador Airforce in March 2009

five of these have already been delivered in march and the remaining 2 will be sent soon. The helicopter called as Dhruv is made by the Indian company HAL.

Battery operated electric Indian car Reva imported in Colombia and Costa Rica

In September 2008, the first battery operated electric Indian car, REVA, arrived in Colombia. The Colombian Minister of Environment, Mr. Juan Lozano, welcomed the arrival of
the car in Colombia noting that its use would significantly reduce pollution levels
and help save increasingly costly non-renewable energy such as gasoline. The
Government of Colombia eliminated customs duty for import of one hundred cars
to promote its use in this country.

Costa Rica has also imported Reva and the government is expected to make its import duty free.

Investment and joint ventures

The cumulative total investment of India in Latin America and Caribbean has reached an impressive ten billion dollars in 2008. The areas include IT, pharma, agrochemicals, steel, mining and petroleum sectors.

IT Business

Indian IT companies have establised software development centres, BPOs and KPOs in Latin America employing 10,000 Latin Americans.

TCS employs 7500 software professionals in Uruguay, Argentina,Chile, Ecuador, Brazil and Mexico. The number of TCS emplyees in Chile is 2000, Brazil 1800, Uruguay 900, Mexico 400, Colombia 200, Argentina 250.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), has opened a new office in the Peruvian capital Lima in July 2010. Alejandro Valenzuela is the manager for Peru, Chile and Ecuador. TCS has identified Peru is an important market with high growth potential for the IT-BPO sector . TCS already has offices in Mexico, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia.

TCS already has offices in Mexico, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia.

TCS has got a 200 million dollars contract (to be implemented in 5 years) from ABN Amro Bank in Brazil and a 140 million dollars contract (to be implemented in 5 years) from a private bank in Ecuador and won a $200 million contract to provide IT services to the Social Security Institute of Mexico (IMSS) over the next four years. TCS has established a Global Delivery Centre and a separate Regional Training Centre at Montevideo in Uruguay. TCS's Global Delivery centre in Gudalajara in Mexico was inagurated by the president of Mexico in may 2007. TCS bought out its joint venture partner Grupo TBA of Brazil for $33.4 million.

The new facility of TCS Global delivery centre in Buenos Aires was inagurated in September 2009. It has plans to increase staff stength from 250 to 1400 in the next few years.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has opened in June 2009, its third global delivery centre in Queretaro, Mexico and seventh in Latin America. The other two Mexican centres are in Mexico City and Guadalajara in Jalisco state. The company expects to hire 500 professionals during the current financial year for its new centre. With over 1,000 people in Mexico alone, TCS plans to take the headcount to 5,000 by 2012.

The new delivery centre in Mexico will provide advanced IT services, consultancy, test factory, business process outsourcing, contact center, IT infrastructure solutions, industrial & engineering services and solutions based on exclusive TCS products to existing and potential customers.

TCS established its operations in Mexico in 2003 and already serves more than 30 local clients in addition to international clients across various industries, including telecom, finance.

TCS acquired a Chilean BPO firm Comicrom in November 2005. TCS provides 70 percent of the processing services for the banking industry in Chile and boasts clients such as Santander, BBVA, AIG and ING. Last month it also won a major contract to provide IT Service for the Chilean Civil Registry.

Mahindra Satyam – 900 Brazilian employees. First design centre set up in Sao Paulo in May 2007. Second one set up in Londrina in the State of Parana.

Infosys- has decided to establish a set up in the state of Belo Horizonte (State of Minas Gerais).

Infosys has set up a Global delivery centre in Mexico. It plans to open a software development and back office centre in Brazil in the seccond half of 2009. Apart from being a local delivery centre, the new unit will also help Infosys gain more business from the regional market. The centre is expected to begin its operations within next three-four months, and is expected to employ around 100 professionals initially across the functions of IT and back office projects.

Infosys sets up its first development centre in Belo Horizonte- december 2009

This is the company's third development centre in Latin America, the other two centres being in Mexico, which service 32 clients and employ 357 professionals.

The centre will offer Infosys' complete suite of services to its Brazilian clients and Brazilian subsidiaries of global customers and will provide language support in English, Portuguese and Spanish. One of the major clients to be servived from this centre is Philips Latin America.

Patni Computer Systems Opens New IT Delivery Center in Queretaro, Mexico on 12 March

Patni Computer Systems is opening a new IT Delivery Center in Queretaro, Mexico to Serve North and Latin American Markets. Jose E. Calzada Rovirosa, Governor of the Queretaro State is cutting the ribbon on 12 march.

Patni is moving from its temporary facility into a permanent location in a high-rise building at ITESM Technological Park of Tech de Monterrey. The new center occupies 11,000 square feet on two floors in ITESM Technological .Patni currently employs 40 in Queretaro. The company has plans to increase employment in the local facility to 200 by the end of 2010, with the bulk of the new hires coming from the local area.
Queretaro is Patni's 22nd development center, expanding a global presence which already features near-shore centers in the United States and Europe. Patni has an employee strength of around 14,000; multiple global delivery centers spread across 13 cities worldwide; 28 international offices across the Americas, Europe and Asia-Pacific; Patni has registered revenues of US $656 million for the year 2009.
For more information on Patni, visit www.patni.com.

Wipro has a BPO centre in Curitiba providing shared services to AmBev, a leading brewery company.

The company has entered a 51:49 Jont venture with Falgo Group to set up IT training centres in Brazil. At present, the company has centres in Mexico, El Salvador and Peru.

Hindustan Computers Ltd ( HCL) the fourth largest Indian IT firm with a turnover of 4 billion dollars is opening a centres in these cities. They will service local and global clients.

ICICI 's BPO wing " First Source" has a BPO in Argentina with 350 staff. Cognizant has also set up operations in Argentina. Bangalore- based 24/7 has a BPO joint venture in Guatemala employing 500 local staff

Iflex has got contracts for banking solutions worth 40 million dollars in Chile, Panama, Mexico, Venezuela, etc.

Sasken Communications has set up a subsidiary company for IT development and support in Nuevo Leon in Mexico.

Indian IT company Geodesic Ltd acquired a Uruguayan software company in Montevideo in May 2009. The Uruguyan company www.interactiveni.com has a staff of 40 persons and specialises in Instant Messaging solutions and applications for moble phones and companies.

Geodesic Ltd is a 130 Million dollar company. It is an innovator in software products focused on Information, Communication and Entertainment (ICE) for mobile phones and desktop computers. Headquartered in Mumbai, India, Geodesic’s Mundu suite of products includes solutions for Instant Messaging, Mobile Voice-over-IP and Internet Radio. Since its inception in 1999, the Mundu Interoperable Instant Messenger has been used by several hundred thousand users on the mobile phone and over 5 million users on the desktop. The company is listed on the National Stock Exchange and Bombay Stock Exchange in India. Geodesic has offices in Mumbai and Bangalore in India, USA, UK, Sweden, Germany, Hong Kong and Mauritius

Geodesic has signed a deal with Bright Star Corporation, Miami, USA to launch Mundu IM on mobile phones in Latin America.

Polaris Software, a leading Indian Financial Technology Company launched its banking platform Global Universal Banking - Intellect 10.0, for the Latin American market.Polaris has identified Latin America as an integral growth market for its expansion strategy.

The Chile centre would serve as the hub for Polaris' Latin American operations. They plan to hire 100 people for the Regional Innovation and Development Centre.

Indian IT company Global Sourcing Solutions has opened a Centre in Buenos Aires in January 2010

Global Sourcing solutions has started off with 200 staff and has plans to expand. The company specialises in mobile software and operates call centres and BPOs. They have operations in Peru, Colombia and Bolivia in Latin America.

The total volume of Indian pharma business in LAC region is about 500 million dollars. This includes supply of bulk drugs, finished formulations and local operations of Indian companies.

Ranbaxy, Strides Arco Labs, Torrent, Claris Life Sciences and Wockhardt have subsidiaries and manufacturing plants in Brazil and other pharma companies are planning investment/JVs in Mexico and Venezuela

Cellofarm( Strides Arcolabs) – two factories – one in Vitoria, Espirito Santo and one in Campos, Rio de Janeiro.

Strides Arcolab acquires pharma assets of Aspen in Brazil, for $ 75 million - March 2010

Strides Arcolab has bought Aspen's ( south african company ) facility in Campos, Brazil, with related products and intellectual properties for about $75 million. It is an all-cash acquisition.

The facility makes Penems and Penicillins and has annual turnover of $40 million.

Strides Arcolabs is already operating in Brazil as Cellofarm with a manufacturing unit in the port city of Vitoria near Rio de Janeiro.

Strides has a manufacturing facility in Mexico City in the name of Solara and has a marketing & trading operation in Venezuela as Sumifarma.

Glenmark – has invested in a new facility near Sao Paulo and has a plant for production of oncological medicines in Buenos Aires.

Manish Pharma – has acquired companies in States of Sao Paulo and Santa Catarina and are already under production.

Dr.Reddy's Labs has bought a pharma plant for 60 million dollars in Mexico in 2006.

Renuka Sugar buys another Brazilian company for US$ 329 million in February 2010

Shree Renuka Sugars Ltd (SRSL), one of the largest Indian producers , has acquired Brazil’s Vale Do Ivaí SA Açúcar e Álcool (VDI) at an enterprise value of $240 million.

SRSL will pay $82 million (Rs 380 crore) now and the balance over eight years. It plans to finance the acquisition by leveraging the $105 million (Rs 506 crore) it raised through a qualified institutional placement (QIP) of shares in July.

The company operates eight sugar mills, five owned and three leased, with a cumulative daily crushing capacity of 35,000 tonnes.

The acquisition of VDI includes two sugar and ethanol production facilities in the southern Brazilian state of Parana, with a combined cane crushing capacity of 3.1 million tonnes a year. VDI holds strategic stakes in several logistics assets, including terminals for storage and loading of sugar and ethanol at the port of Paranagua.

The acquisition also includes 18,000 hectares of cultivable land under VDI, through which the company meets the larger part of its sugarcane requirements. The land is on long-term lease and used to cultivate cane with an average yield of 95 tonnes a hectare, with recovery of 13 per cent. In India, the yield (around 60-65 tonnes per hectare) and the recovery (a maximum of 11.5 per cent) are lower.

Bajaj Hindustan, Rajashree Sugars, Godavari Sugarmills, and even Reliance are considering acquisition of sugarcane estates and sugar and ethanol plants in Brazil. Bajaj Hindustan has already set up a subsidiary in Brazil and earmarked 500 million dollars for investment.

Olam, a Non-resident Indian company has entered into agricultural production in Argentina and cultivated 17,000 hectares. Peanut is their main crop. They have also acquired two peanut processing plants.

Some other Indian companies have shown interest in acquistion of agricultural land in Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay.

There is significant scope for investment and joint ventures in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay and Uruguay, as well as in Caribbean.

In recent years, Reliance has been importing crude oil from Mexico, Venezuela, Brazil and Ecuador. Their imports are likely to increase in the coming years after their commissioning of a 28 million tons refinery in 2008.

OVL(ONGC Videsh Ltd) has acquired oil field concessions in Brazil, Venezuela and Cuba. OVL has already invested about a billions of dollars in the Brazilian project. OVL is part of a consortium in the exploration and production of oil from Carabobo-1 project in the Orinoco region of Venezuela. The other Indian members of the consortium are Indian Oil Corporation and Oil India Ltd. The foreign partners in the consortium are Repsol of Spain and Petronas of Malaysia.The Indian companies have 18% share while Repsol and Petronas have 11% each while the Venezuelan state oil company has 60% share. The three Indian companies will invest 2.18 billion dollars in the project.

In Colombia it has bought a producing oilfield for 500 million dollars in a 50:50 joint venture with the Chinese company, Sinopec. OVL is establishing tie-ups with Ecuadorean and Argentine state oil companies for projects in these countries.

BPR : Bharat Petro Resources, wholly owned subsidiary of BPCL, alongwith Videocon International have acquired ten blocs in Brazil from Encana of Canada valued at US$ 280 million.

Bharat Petroleum and Videocon consortium strike offshore oil in Brazil - November 2009

The consortium has discovered additional oil in an exploration acreage in the Campos basin, off the Brazilian coast.

The consortium has discovered more than 90 feet of high-quality oil in their Wahoo-2 well block, also identified as BM-C-30, The well is five miles to the north from the original Wahoo discovery well. In October 2008, the consortium had made its first discovery in the block during drilling of Wahoo well.

Reliance has acquired the Borojo off-shore oil bloc in the Tumaco basin on the Pacific coast of Colombia and is interested in other countries of the region including Peru and in upstream ventures in Mexico .Reliance is bidding for a project to build a refinery in central america.

In Peru, Reliance Industries has signed an agreement with Pan Andean Resources for the joint exploitation of the hydrocarbons Block 141, consisting of 1.2 million acres located in the Titicaca basin in Puno province. Whereas Pan Andean would own 10% of the Block, the remaining 90% would vest with Reliance. The company has also taken 30% stake in block 108 and 10% stake in block 39( along with Burlington Resources and Repsol). Reliance has also a joint venture with the Argentine energy company Pluspetrol for a large project for exploration of gas in Peru. In this, Reliance has 20% share while Woodside of australia has 30% and Pluspetrol 50%. Investment in these projects in 2008-12 would be over 600 million dollars.

Under this deal, Ecopetrol will take a 20 percent stake in the Borojo North Block 42 and the Borojo South Block 43, which together cover an area of about 8,000 square kilometres in water depths ranging from 60-1,500 metres.Reliance's unit will hold the rest of the stake in the blocks and will be their operator.

There is scope for our companies to acquire oil acreage in Ecuadorand Argentina.

Suzlon Energy Ltd of India has secured ( 2006) a wind energy project in north east Brazil. The capacity is 225 MW , comprising 107 units of the Suzlon S88 – 2.1 MW turbines for installations in six projects.

Suzlon is the world’s largest wind turbine generator (WTG) manufacturer in terms of market capitalization. The Company has been ranked the 5th leading WTG manufacturer in the world an the largest in India and Asia in terms of market share in 2005.

Suzlon offers customers total wind power solutions including consultancy, manufacturing, operations & maintenance services. Suzlon is a multinational company with offices, R&D and technology centers, manufacturing facilities and service support centers spread across the globe. Suzlon’s global footprint includes Asia, Australia, Europe, and North America.

Suzlon has design and R&D teams and facilities in Belgium, Germany, Netherlands and India. The international business of Suzlon is managed out of Aarhus, Denmark where Suzlon has established a wholly owned subsidiary, Suzlon Energy A/S, which in turn has country headquarters in Beijing, Chicago and Melbourne for China, United States and Australia respectively. More info at www.suzlon.com

Latin America is endowed with large reserves of minerals. While we are importing copper and other minerals, no investment has taken place so far.

Jindal Group is the first one to enter this sector through their 2.3 billion dollars investment in the El Mutun iron ore project in Bolivia.

The Essar group has bagged a mineral concession in Amapa, North Brazil, which will cater to its steel plant in Trinidad and Tobago. The area of the concession is 7,851.69 hectares. It is 150 km from the Santana Public Port in Macapa, on the banks of the Amazon river and close to Essar’s proposed steel plant in Trinidad and Tobago.

The Brazil iron ore resource would be Essar Steel’s second international raw material deposit. In 2007, Essar Steel acquired Minnesota Steel, which has more than 1.4 billion tonnes of iron ore resources in the Mesabi range.

There is scope for mining ventures in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Peru and also in the Caribbean.

Mahindra – Bramont JV for fabrication of Scorpio 4-wheel drives in Manaus.

Essar is building a 2.5-million-tonnes steel plant in Trinidad and Tobago is part of the group’s plan of achieving a capacity of 20-25 million tonnes by 2012 from the present level of eight million tonnes.

BEML has established an assembly plant in Espirito de Santo province of Brasil to manaufacture mining, earthmoving and railway equipments.

Another company Besco has already entered into a JV in the southern Brazil for manufacture of railway wagons.

Aditya Birla Group, through their Group company Hindalco Industries, had earlier this year acquired the US based aluminum sheet maker Novelis Inc in a deal worth around US$ 6 billion. Novelis has assets in Brazil in the States of Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo in the cities of Ouro Preto, Pindamonhangaba, Utinga and Petrocoque.

Essel Propack has plants in Colombia and Mexico which manufacture laminated plastic tubes.

Bilcare from Pune is in the process of setting up a plant in Brazil for manufacture of pharma packaging materials.

United Phosphorus Ltd (UPL) of Mumbai has acquired three Argentinian agrochem and seeds companies. The first acquisition was Reposo SA in 2005, the second was ICONA in 2007 and the third Advanta a Dutch company( 2006) which has Argentine units. With these, UPL now has four manufacturing units and a R and D unit (employing 250 Argentines). The R and D unit is bringing out a new sunflower oil branded as Nutrisun, a high-stearic oil, as an alternative to transfat edible oils.

In 2008 the Indian company United Phosphorus bought the Colombian agro company EvoFarms.

United Phosporous Ltd( UPL) has acquired in June 2010 the global non-mixture mancozeb fungicide business and related assets from DuPont, including existing inventory, manufacturing and formulation production facilities in Barranquilla, Colombia.

UPL is a global crop protection,seeds and chemical company with a turnover of a billion dollars in 2008 and ranks as the third largest generic agrochemical company in the world.

Another company Punjab Chemicals and Crop Protection Ltd ( PCCPL) has acquired an Argentine company " Sintesis quimica ". They have 2 factories in Argentina.

Pidilite has acquired a Brazilian adhesive company.

Havells, the Indian lighting and fixtures firm has acquired the assets and business of Sylavania of US in Latin Amwrica worth 200 million dollars. They have three plants in Brasil, Colombia and Costa Rica. The chief of operations of the Americas region Mr Kapil Gulati manages the regional business from Costa Rica.

Videocon has acquired a TV manufacturing plant (owned by Thomson) in Mexico .

Vijay Electricals from Hyderabad has acquired a Transformers plant in Joao Pessoa in the northeast of Brazil for over a million dollars. They will invest more to expand capacity and reach a turnover of over 50 million dollars.

Elgi Equipments, a leading manufacturer of compressors in India has launched a 100% subsidiary at Sao Paolo in Brazil to directly market its products. It would also start manufacturing the products in the country soon.

Elgi is based in Coimbatore in the state of Tamilnadu.

Elgi has made the first stage investment of around two million dollars. After an 18-24 months gestation period, the new company would set up a manufacturing plant and commence commercial production, he said. ‘Elgi Compressores Do Brazil’ would engage in marketing of electric and diesel screw compressors. It would also set up a wide network of distributors with main focus on service and after marketproducts.

The Indian companies are yet to explore opportunities in other sectors such as forestry and mining. Commercial forests are available in countries such as Brazil , Chile , Argentina , Guyana and Panama . Timber, wood products and paper pulp can be imported into India from these ventures. There are also opportunities for phosphate mining in Argentina , Coal in Colombia and gold and diamond in Venezuela , bauxite, iron ore and other minerals in Caribbean.

Weg has a subsidiary operation in India. They are supplying heavy electrical motors and generators.

Dedini has entered into an MOU with The Walchand Group for supply of equipments for ethanol production in India.

IMPSA of Argentina has set up an office in Guragaon seeking opportunities in Hydroelectric power sector.

Biosidus of Argentina has shown interest in establishing a plant in India to produce biotech products.

Mexican companies have enetered India in food processing, multiplex theatres and low-cost housing sectors.

This is a special trade promotion initiative of the commerce ministry of India implemented in collaboration with business, since 1997. Under this, there are a number of proactive measures, including financial support for Indian companies to explore the LAC market, for participation in trade fairs, market studies, BSMs etc. Financial support is also given for LAC importers to visit India. The support is provided through export promotion councils and trade and industry bodies only and not directly to individual companies

This was concluded in march 2005. Preferential duty ( 10-20 percent in most cases) is given to 452 Indian products entering mercosur and reciprocal concession to 450 products of mercosur entering India. The PTA has become effective from June 2009.

A preferential trade agreement with chile was concluded in November 2005 and was signed on 8 March 2006. India has agreed to give preferential duties to 276 chilean export items while chile will reciprocate for 296 Indian items. It has been agreed to move towards a FTA later.

Eximbank has given commercial lines of credit to governments, commercialbanks and regional organisations in LAC region.

Note Most of the above LOCs remain unutilised due to different reasons in different countries. Indian Exporters and LAC importers are welcome to utilise them. Eximbank would be willing to consider more LOCs for LAC countries.

- about 350 ITEC ( Indian technical and economic cooperation) training scholarships to LAC countries every year

-project assistance eg. 6 million dollars grant for a cricket stadium in Guyana, 1.6 million dollars grant for the computerisation of Caricom secretriat.

- emergency and disaster relief assistance in the form of medicines and other supplies from time to time given to a number of countries.

-has set up IT training centres in Cuba, Panama and Guatemala and plans to set up in other central american and caribbean countries and also in paraguay and uruguay..

Corporation Andina de Fomento (CAF)	Bolivia , Colombia , Ecuador , Peru and Venezuela	USD 10 mn	CAF is processing a few proposals and is expected to refer the same to Exim Bank, upon their approval.
Central American Bank for Economic Integration (BCIE)	Bolivia , Colombia , Ecuador , Peru and Venezuela	USD 10 mn	BCIE is expected to refer proposals to Exim Bank.
Banco Nacional de Comercio Exterior S.N.C. (Bancomext)	Mexico	USD 10 mn	Bancomext is expected to refer a few proposals to Exim Bank, to be covered under the above facility.
Banco de Comercio Exterior de Colombia (Bancoldex)	Colombia	USD 10 mn	Bancoldex is yet to refer any transaction to EXIM Bank, to be covered under the LOC facility.
Banco Bradesco S.A.	Brazil	USD 10 mn	One contract for USD 80,000.00 has been approved. More contracts are expected to be covered under the LOC.
Republic Bank	Trinidad & Tobago	USD 8 mn	The LOC Agreement has recently been made effective on May 14, 2004 and the LOC is expected to be utilized soon.
UNIBANCO	Brazil	USD 10 mn	The LOC Agreement has just been signed and it will be made effective upon compliance with conditions precedent, by UNIBANCO, as per the LOC Agreement. A contract for cement plant for USD 4.5 mn is expected to be approved shortly, once the LOC is made effective.