The Dominican Republic’s State-bank could be signaling a closer embrace of mainland China. 

In its handling of e-waste Central America is a model for the rest of the world today, said a leading international expert. 

Peru is the second most profitable country in the region for direct foreign investment.  President Ollanta Humala said that mining companies should help Peru reduce its dependency on metal prices. 

Across the region the international day in celebration of labor was contested territory.  In several countries with center-left governments May Day festivities were used to reaffirm the government’s role in the economy, while opposition members used the day to complain about government overreach.  In countries with “neoliberal” governments opposition movements protested the lack of government

The Argentine Industrial Union, UIA, the country’s most powerful manufacturers’ lobby, released the results of a poll covering 300 corporations that decried the low level of economic activity expected this year, and predicate little in the way of jobs creation and more layoffs. 

The bad news is that the Colombian exports to the United States have fallen; the good news is that the informal economy is shrinking. 

Combined coffee exports from nine countries in Latin America (not including Brazil) fell 2.85% in the first half of harvest that began in October. 

In Guatemala there are two farming systems: a “modern” and “technological” version located on the southern coast, and another, “based on the colonial model of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries” remains “rooted in the departments of Alta and Baja Verapaz.” 

With car production down 16% in Argentina and 8.4% in the first quarter of 2014 compared to the same three months last year, both Argentina and Brazil are keen to extend their existing agreement. 

Drought in the coffee-growing areas of Brazil is likely to lead to losses both for the 2014 and 2015 seasons, though consumers are less pessimistic about unemployment and inflation.