Foreign Minister and AGCI welcomed new grant holders from Latin America and the Caribbean

Monday, March 28, 2011

With a total of 71 professionals who were awarded scholarships by the Chilean Agency for International Cooperation (AgCI)were launched the first Master‘s degree programs of the twelve Chilean universities that receive students from various countries in Latin American and the Caribbean,  benefited by the government’s   international cooperation agency.

AgCi’s cooperation scholarship program began in 1993 and aims at strengthening development in the Latin American and Caribbean region, through human capital formation and access to opportunities for specialization, as a complementary effort to the technical assistance initiatives that Chile exchanges with its neighbors and third countries.

During a welcoming ceremony held this morning at the José Miguel Carrera Building, Foreign Minister Alfred Moreno was pleased to receive the professionals awarded scholarships and mentioned the importance he attaches to these kinds of programs for international relations, since they are based on people and “people are the ones who build ties between countries.”Joking with the scholars, he told them he felt envy after recalling his postgraduate studies in the U.S. as a scholar from Chile.”

The acting Director of AgCI, Ms. Lexy Orozco, referred to the importance of human capital formation within cooperation, since programs like these “will give strength to our choice of quality growth with equity as long as we can overcome our differences and set ourselves common goals, based on technical and professional training, the consolidation of democracy, social justice, the willingness to engage in an ongoing and open-minded dialogue.

The fellowship  program aims at favoring fields of study that are essential for development such as promotion of production, agriculture and livestock  science, environment , government administration, economy, health and nutrition , among other areas of knowledge in which our country can contribute with its expertise.

This year’s grant holders mainly come from Bolivia, Ecuador and Haiti. There are also students  from Argentina , Peru, Colombia, Ecuador , Paraguay, Uruguay, Costa Rica , El Salvador , Guatemala , Honduras , Nicaragua, Jamaica and Dominican Republic.

Their academic destinations will be twelve universities from different regions in the country, inter alia, Universidad de Chile,  Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile,  Universidad de Santiago, Universidad de Concepción, Universidad Austral, Universidad de La Frontera, Universidad Católica del Norte, Universidad de Antofagasta.

In 2010 this effort meat an investment of $ 1, 206.000 pesos from the national budget allocated to AgCi to fund full scholarships awarded through the Republic of Chile Scholarship Program, Chile-Mexico Reciprocity Scholarship and for a diploma degree in Health and Nutrition. For this year, a budget for $ 1, 182. 000 million pesos was scheduled.