Turkey, Peru free trade talks end without deal

LIMA - Anadolu Agency

Turkey will not land its second free trade agreement in South America before the end of 2014, a Peruvian official confirmed late Dec. 2.

The second round of talks here last week achieved “positive results,” but the parties will reconvene in the Turkish capital of Ankara next March, Peru’s Minister for Foreign Trade and Tourism Magali Silva said.
Peru has made “significant advances” in negotiating technical barriers on trade and discussed for the first time a chapter on boosting investment.

But areas of friction were “obvious for both sides,” Turkey’s ambassador to Peru told the Anadolu Agency in an exclusive interview.

“Peru has a textiles industry that it wants to protect and Turkey is sensitive in terms of agricultural products, but these are just short or midterm concerns, because free and fair trade is in the interests of both sides in the long term,” Ferda Akkerman said.

In October, Silva said the negotiations were likely to finish by the year’s end, state news agency Andina reported. The second round of talks were originally scheduled for May, but did not take place until six months later.

Delegations from both countries declined to comment on the respective differences in brokering a deal.

Turkey is the bigger player in the arrangement, exporting more than five times that of Peru in 2014.

Purchases from Turkey increased 36 percent to $336.8 million, notably in iron, steel and their derivatives, while Peruvian shipments fell 15 percent to $64 million, made up of fishery, mining and textile products.

Turkey signed its first agreement on the continent with Chile in 2009.