President Leonel Fernández appealed to the United States to adopt a visionary leadership position and forge a strategic alliance with Central America and the Caribbean. He urged the US to strengthen its ties with the region by passing the textile parity bill, still pending in the US Congress. He delivered the keynote address at the 23rd Miami Conference on the Caribbean and Latin America, Dec. 7-10. He spoke during the Plenary Dinner of Thursday, December 9 at 7 pm at the Miami Inter-Continental Hotel. During his talk he highlighted US investments in the DR in recent years: Allegro Resorts (tourism), US$50 million. (Foreign investment in tourism has been over US$300 million from January to October 1999, with 5,773 new hotel rooms.) Codetel and Tricom (telecommunications) US$220 million. NYPRO (plastics) US$10 million. Swedish Match North America (tobacco) US$11 million. Braun Medical (medical supplies) US$2 million Colgate Palmolive (consumer goods) is expanding its operations. Citibank (banking) is expanding its operations. AES (power supply) is investing in the power distribution system. (Together with the Spanish firm Unión Fenosa, the investment of the power distributors is US$320 million.) In Miami, President Fernández met with investors to promote the Santo Domingo Cyberpark, a high tech industrial complex. President Fernández is expected back in Santo Domingo tonight. This morning, he was scheduled to give a conference on "Dominican Republic: Policies and Priorities" at the University of Miami. The Miami Conference is organized by the Caribbean/Latin American Action (C/LAA). C/LAA is a Washington-based non-profit corporation that has as objective to work year-round to promote prosperity for the Caribbean and Latin America and for those who do business there. For more information on the conference, see www.claa.org
