Thais Leitao
Reporter - Agência Brasil

Rio - Yesterday minister of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade, Luiz Fernando Furlan, and the United States secretary of Commerce, Carlos Gutierrez, signed a letter of intentions establishing an Informal Consultation Mechanism (Mecanismo de Consultas Informais).

Furlan reports that the mechanism will consist of four work groups which will deal with the following broad areas: first, cooperation between Brazil's National Institute of Industrial Metrology, Norms and Quality (Instituto Nacional de Metrologia, Normalização e Qualidade Industrial) (Inmetro) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology; second, facilitate business, exports, investments and cooperation between the Brazilian and American patent offices (Instituto Nacional de Propriedade Industrial) (INPI) and United States Patent and Tradmark Office (USPTO)).

Furlan added that Brazil will seek "aggressive goals" in the area of trade during bilateral talks that begin today and will continue in a second stage in Washington in September.

Although the two ministers did not discuss the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), Gutierrez declared that he believes that continental America can and should compete with any other region of the world. "Call it anything you want. The important thing is that we all live together here in this place we call America and as a group we have a bright future full of opportunities. We can create jobs, growth, prosperity and give our people the results they deserve."

Furlan added that the two countries will discuss standards for biofuels. "Brazil and the United States are the biggest producers and users of biofuels [Brazil's ethanol is made from sugarcane, while the US uses ethanol mostly made from corn]. Inmetro and Nist will work together to set up standards for this area which has an enormous potential. We will include discussions of the question of emissions and are willing to make our conclusions available to other countries."

Translation: Allen Bennett