Recognizing the potential of agricultural cooperation between the Philippines and Uruguay, the two countries are set to develop an action plan that will mainly involve agricultural exchanges.

Uruguay's Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Valeria Csukasi, disclosed in an interview on Friday, Nov. 8, that their side and the Philippines agreed to craft the action plan within the next three years.

Csukasi bared this after "long" and "fruitful" meetings with officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and Department of Trade and Investment (DTI).

"So, today, we had a very fruitful, long meeting in which we analyzed regional issues, bilateral issues. We talked about trade, we talked about multilateralism, we talked about peace, security, we talked about food security, agriculture cooperation," Csukasi said.

"At the end of the day, there were so many ideas that we decided to come up with an action plan that we will develop in the coming three years," she disclosed.

"So we can check what it is that we are going to look at. But the center of the agenda, I think we agree it has to go mainly with agriculture cooperation," she further said.

The Uruguayan official explained that the first step is to put in writing what they have discussed during her short visit to Manila, ahead of the 50th anniversary of the Philippine-Uruguay diplomatic relations.

"Our idea is to first put in paper what we discussed today, so we know the objectives, the concrete objectives that we have in signing an MOU (memorandum of understanding) on agricultural cooperation, or focusing on particular activities, or getting together researchers from one side and the other to do some joint research," Csukasi said.

"All of those ideas that we went through today, we want to put them in writing so we commit ourselves in the coming three years to develop them and that probably would make of course more visits from officials of Uruguay to this side and I hope that from the Philippines also to Uruguay," she noted.

According to Csukasi, Uruguay mainly produces agriculture and livestock products, stressing that Uruguay and the Philippines are "completely complementary" in this field.

She emphasized that the potential partnership in agriculture between the two countries would not only include selling and buying products from each other, but also the sharing of agricultural practices of Uruguay to the Philippines.

Csukasi said they are willing to share their experiences with the Philippines to improve the way it does farming, especially in remote rural areas.

"So, it's not only selling our products, it's buying sometimes also products from the Philippines like mango, banana, pineapples. We talked about coffee, coconut. So, there's potential there, but we also talked about learning from the experience of Uruguay that has very sophisticated and professional agriculture sector," Csukasi said.

"Well, if you think about what you are producing and exporting, those are exactly the same that we buy in Uruguay. So we are completely complementary," the ambassador also said.

With the upcoming agriculture partnership and a possible business-to-business deal, Csukasi said Uruguay could serve as the entry point for the Philippines to other South American countries.

She underscored that "Uruguay is also a very well-respected entry point to the rest of South America," thus, the Philippines could use Uruguay as the entry door to some of the other markets in the region.

"One of the things that we discussed today with the trade and industry chamber, was how to do some business-to-business opportunities, in which exporters from both countries can realize that there are opportunities here," Csukasi said.

"So, our idea is to start working in bringing exporters and investors together so they recognize the opportunities and when they see them, they can start implementing it," she added.

Although the Philippine-Uruguay diplomatic ties will reach its 50th year, Csukasi bared that it was actually the first time both countries conducted their first bilateral consultation.

The Uruguayan ambassador said among the objectives of her visit to Manila was to "to start having conversations with the authorities and to start identifying which areas have the potential to grow and what we can do together."

"We have the first bilateral consultation between the two countries. It's unbelievable that in 50 years of relationship we never had a formal bilateral consultation," she shared.

Csukasi, however, said they always recognize the shared values and principles they have with the countries they are posted to, expressing that they intend to work on developing those shared values and principles and increasing the trade and investment ties with countries like the Philippines.

She also cited the need to "look a little bit more around the world and find new partners" despite the fact that Uruguay is geographically far away from the region.

"Because we are geographically far away, sometimes we tend to focus more in our region, closer regions, in our neighboring countries and I get the feeling that for the last, maybe decade, both Latin America and Asia, we've been looking inwards, much more in developing our regions and their ties with our neighboring countries and not so much about other neighbors, or maybe we are more focusing more in other neighbors or other partners, and not so much on us," she said.

"But if you look at what's going on, this year, I've seen so many authorities from Latin American countries coming here. That shows that probably because of the uncertainty that we're living, we realize that we need to reinforce friendships that we forgot we have available," she added.

What changed, Csukasi stressed, was that Uruguay and countries, like the Philippines, are now talking about diversifying in terms of trade, investments, and cooperation sources to learn "from countries that are more similar to us and not from countries who have completely different experiences."

"So, there have been some visits in the past, we have had some events in the past but I would say changed a lot is that in uncertain times after Covid for example, we realized that we needed to look a little bit more around the world and find new partners, new friends, or develop more those friendships that we're sleeping in a way," the ambassador said.

The vice foreign minister also disclosed that they are hoping to establish a consulate in Manila by next year, and are even eyeing to open an embassy.

"We are, yes, and definitely we are looking into opening an embassy, let's hope that  it would be in a year's time," she said.

"This thing takes a little bit of time, we need to get the budget for it, we need to do all the protocol aspects but our idea is to have a local embassy in the Philippines. I see that would help a lot also to create a different framework for our relationship," she added.

Csukasi further disclosed that Uruguay Foreign Minister Mario Lubetkin may visit the country next year for the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) ministerial conference.

"We already are looking into the possible visit of our Foreign Minister next year to celebrate the ASEAN ministerial conference, he was invited by your foreign minister. I think he is looking forward to come here by next year, and that would be another milestone that would have to continue advancing the relationship," Csukasi said.