• Minister Juan Andrés Fontaine and the Director General of Concessions, Hugo Vera, met with Japanese companies in Tokyo during a tour organized by InvestChile that will continue in Singapore and China.

In a series of activities in Asia, Minister Juan Andrés Fontaine is promoting the Public Works Ministry’s new portfolio of concessions projects. Including highways, hospitals, reservoirs, trams and cable cars, the projects, in which Asian companies or consortia can participate, represent a total investment of US$14,600 million.

The tour, organized by InvestChile, began in Tokyo where Minister Fontaine and the Director General of Concessions, Hugo Vera, along with InvestChile’s Head of Promotion, Ian Frederick, and its Investment Attaché in Japan, Vicente Pinto, held meetings with more than 20 companies and investment banks with whom they discussed the opportunities offered by the portfolio of projects and the advantages of investing in a market like Chile.

“We have seen great interest in our country. The image of Chile is highly valued, as a safe country, a stable country, where there are good opportunities for investors. Japan wants to diversify its investment around the world and Chile is seen as a good gateway into Latin America. We are very optimistic about the intention of Japanese companies to participate and help implement the agenda which, as a government, we have set for Chile,” said Minister Fontaine.

Ian Frederick, the acting director of InvestChile, indicated that “the agency has more than 100 Japanese clients which reflects the interest of this country’s businesspeople in the opportunities available in Chile. These companies are developing projects in sectors such as the food industry, global services and energy, and we are confident that we will soon have more Japanese companies following in their footsteps in the infrastructure sector.”

Japan is the main Asian investor in Chile, with a stock of investment of U$$5,851 million (2016), accounting for 27% of all Asian investment in Chile.

The delegation’s activities will continue in Singapore and Beijing, where, as part of ChileWeek, InvestChile will hold a workshop for Chinese infrastructure companies as well as a series of meetings.