Spain and Cuba have signed today in Havana collaboration agreements on commercial relations and investment in R + D + I with the aim of taking advantage of the new opportunities that Spanish companies open on the island. The ministers of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain, Luis de Guindos, and that of Foreign Trade of Cuba, Rodrigo Malmierca, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Economic Cooperation with measures such as providing an efficient institutional framework and identifying priority sectors for mutual collaboration. In R + D + i, Minister De Guindos and the Minister of Science, Technology and Environment of Cuba, Elba Rosa Pérez Montoya, have signed a collaboration agreement with the Spanish CDTI with the commitment to facilitate financing for projects of common interest in sectors already identified, among other measures. The period of validity in both cases is five years.
The commitment in the area of economic cooperation establishes the creation of a Working Group on Trade and Investment (GTCI) whose objective is to provide an institutional framework to deepen economic relations between Spain and Cuba. In addition to improving trade, it seeks to identify new areas of cooperation and make recommendations to avoid any obstacles that may arise in its development.
Among the objectives is also to promote the transfer of knowledge and exchange of experiences, facilitate business missions and exchange of experts, including the organization of study visits between the two countries and support the establishment and development of contacts between Spanish companies and Cuban Bilateral investments and economic flows will also be encouraged in accordance with their respective national laws and regulations.
The Working Group will be chaired by the Minister of Foreign Trade and Foreign Investment of Cuba and by the Secretary of State for Commerce of the Kingdom of Spain. Among its functions will be to monitor the provisions of this Memorandum, evaluate bilateral economic relations and present recommendations to the competent authorities of both countries with the aim of promoting and facilitating trade and investment. Among its objectives will be to identify the problems that hinder trade and investment and bilateral economic cooperation and recommend measures to the designated authorities of both countries for their solution.
Regarding the Collaboration Agreement with CDTI in the field of R & D & I, both countries undertake to promote the development of projects by financing those that are declared of common interest. These will be developed within the framework of a Bilateral Program of Technological Cooperation, which will pay special attention to the criteria of degree of innovation in each of the countries, financial capacity of the partners to develop the project, degree of commitment of the parties and impact on the economies of each of the two countries.
The projects must be innovative, from a technological point of view, and be executed between companies and institutions of both countries in one of the following priority areas: Information and Communications Technologies, Agrifood, Biotechnology, Electronics, Logistics and Transportation , Chemistry, Climate Change and Renewable Energies.
