• Karla Flores, the agency’s director, was one of the keynote speakers at a business meeting in Osaka during President Gabriel Boric’s visit to Japan and China.

With a focus on cooperation between nations and investment opportunities in Chile, InvestChile Director Karla Flores is participating in President Gabriel Boric’s tour of Asia, which began this Sunday.

The visit is part of the president’s appearance at the fourth ministerial meeting of the China-CELAC Forum, and includes activities in Japan (Tokyo and Osaka) and Beijing.

After a first day in the Japanese capital, which included a meeting between the president and the prime minister of Japan, Shigeru Ishiba, the director of InvestChile -along with the presidential delegation and InvestChile’s investment attaché in Asia, Catalina Pérez- headed to Osaka to participate in the National Day of Chile on Monday morning at Expo Osaka. This world fair is currently taking place in the Japanese city, where Chile is represented by the “Makün, the Mantle of Chile” pavilion.

Around 160 nations are participating in the fair, which is expected to receive more than 28 million visitors.

At the event, President Gabriel Boric asserted that “Chile is the natural bridge between the Asia-Pacific and Latin America, and offers a stable, open and reliable business environment for trade and investment.”

Business meeting

During the afternoon, Karla Flores was one of the keynote speakers at the Business Meeting on Trade and Investment in Chile, chaired by President Boric. It was attended by more than 150 senior representatives of Japan’s private sector, alongside Chile’s delegation of authorities and business leaders.

In her presentation, InvestChile director highlighted the country’s macroeconomic performance, the importance of foreign investment, the solidity and reliability Chile offers to Japanese companies and its business opportunities. “The international context makes our opportunities in new sectors more important, in line with global needs for decarbonization and sustainable development. Green mining, critical minerals and the national lithium strategy, renewable energy, green hydrogen -where in recent months we’ve had announcements worth US$27 billion- and the digital economy are just some of the areas where Japanese investment is already present and where there is still room for further growth,” she commented.

President Gabriel Boric highlighted the strong trade relationship between the two countries and the opportunities for collaboration in strategic sectors such as disaster prevention, clean energy, technology and innovation. He also emphasized that “the State must offer guarantees that the rules of the game are respected. That’s the institutional strength Chile has. Let me tell you, then, that opportunities for growth together are vast. Therefore, I invite you to further deepen and diversify our economic partnership.”

Deep dialogue

The event also included speeches by Tatsushi Amano, Managing Executive Officer of the Japan Bank for International Cooperation; Rosario Navarro, President of SOFOFA; and Takehiko Kakiuchi, Chairman of the Board of the Mitsubishi Corporation. In their speeches, they highlighted the tradition of cooperation between Japan and Chile, Japan’s global leadership in technology and innovation, and the need for deeper dialogue between Chile’s private sector and the Japanese business ecosystem.

Japan is the main Asian investor in Chile, with a stock exceeding US$7.2 billion, according to Banco Central (Central Bank) figures. It is also one of the focus markets for InvestChile, whose investment office for Asia has been based in Tokyo since 2017.

The presidential tour will continue tomorrow with a series of activities in Beijing, including a massive business meeting and the InvestChile Talks event, a dialogue organized by the agency that will bring together senior representatives of Chinese companies and be attended by Foreign Affairs Minister Alberto van Klaveren.