The APEC Peru 2016 Leaders Summit meetings theme this year is "Quality growth and human development", which sums up the aim of this meeting to promote sustainable development and enhance the human capital of the 21 member economies of this multilateral forum that brings together diverse powers such as China, United States, Korea, Russia and Japan.
In this context, the Vice Dean of Universidad del Pacífico (UP) International Business program, Oscar Malca, analyzed the opportunities the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum offers so that our country can achieve greater participation in exports within this region through a better technological and academic cooperation between Peru and Asian countries mainly.
Peruvian strategy in these meetings
APEC is one of the most dynamic areas in the world, with almost 50% of the world's GDP. Therefore it is a great privilege for Peru to be considered. Besides hosting this meeting in Lima, we were forced to take advantage of this opportunity and to establish contacts at the highest level.
"First, we want to develop a plan to develop more products through broader cooperation in technology transfer, especially with the Asian countries, whose agendas also include this specific point," said Malca.
In that regard, he said that Peru is a meeting point between all these economies, but it is also a HUB, since we have economic integration agreements with the region. We are, therefore, one of the three Latin American countries, together with Chile and Mexico, which could generate a HUB for technology transfer.
The challenge of increasing exports in the Asia Pacific region
When we look at the commercial participation ratio of Peru in the Asia Pacific region, we see that the number is very small. The challenge is to improve our participation rate, which implies sustainable growth. To do this, we need to improve not only the added value of existing products, but also have the right professionals to interact in this great diversity of cultures that are part of the APEC.
"Proper management and interaction with these markets involve the professional human capital specialized in international business making a great effort to contribute to the internationalization of the economy. Selling an alpaca garment at origin is different than selling the same garment at destination. The difference is in the human capital that is able to manage the interaction between products and target markets", added the Vice Dean of the UP International Business program.
UP in the Asia Pacific
Oscar Malca also noted that Peru has an educational system that can be strengthened through networks such as the Redap (Peruvian Network for Asia Pacific Studies), which can grow mainly in collaboration with the Asian side of APEC. For example, binational research projects could be carried out between the business and the university sectors in both regions.
"Another important issue is the exchange of faculty and students, who should go to these countries to do work and have physical presence in order to reduce cultural distance. The university has a program called Global Manager Assistant, whose purpose is to collaborate with the interaction at global meeting points in Asia, so that students begin to get used to this type of relationship as we do with the United States and Europe," he said.
Finally, he emphasized that within the APEC meetings, leaders and sources of information will be identified to indicate what these global meeting points are. For example, Hong Kong is an excellent global meeting point and if it is possible for Peruvian companies, accompanied by students of the International Business program, to interact with important economic agents of that region, it would be a great support for the promotion of the country's exports and would reinforce the managerial capacity for the internationalization of the Peruvian economy.