BIOS FOR AGRICULTURE, ENERGY, TRANSPORT & HOUSING

UNCLAS LIMA 003137 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS DEPT FOR WHA/AND, WHA/EPSC, EB/OMA, EB/TPP COMMERCE FOR 4331/MAC/WH/MCAMERON USTR FOR BHARMAN AND MCARRILLO E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ECON PGOV ETRD EINV TBIO PREL PE SUBJECT: BIOS FOR AGRICULTURE, ENERGY, TRANSPORT & HOUSING MINISTERS REF: A) LIMA 3102 (B) LIMA 3013 ¶1. (U) Biographic information for President Alan Garcia's Ministers of Agriculture, Energy and Mining, Transportation, and Housing follows below. These ministers took office on July 28, 2006. See Ref A for the bios of the Prime Minister and Foreign, Defense, and Interior Ministers, and Ref B for bios on the Ministers of Finance, Trade, and Production. Agriculture - Jose Salazar -------------- ¶2. (U) Juan Jose SALAZAR Garcia is an agricultural engineer and a rice, cotton and sugar cane producer. He was President of the Northwestern Maranon Region from 1989 to 1992 (an ill-fated legislative attempt to carve macroregions out of Peru's departments) and Mayor of Ferrenafe (Lambayeque Department) for two terms (1987-1989 & 2003-2006). ¶3. (U) Salazar was born in Ferrenafe on February 18, 1947. He received his agricultural engineering degree from Peru's National University of Lambayeque (now Pedro Ruiz Gallo University). He has spoken on local government management, regionalization and decentralization at numerous academic events around the world. He is a longtime member of the APRA party. ¶4. (U) Comment: Salazar will be a key player in implementing APRA's "Sierra Exportadora" plan to increase exports from the poor living in Peru's highlands. He has already announced that he will focus on agricultural research, technical assistance and the construction of small irrigation infrastructure as the first step of the plan. Salazar will probably restructure the Ministry of Agriculture to emphasize these activities. He supports the U.S.-Peru Trade Promotion Agreement, and has expressed the need to switch from traditional crops to exportable products, taking advantage of the PTPA as a way to reduce poverty. End Comment. Energy & Mines - Juan Valdivia -------------- ¶5. (U) Juan Gualberto VALDIVIA Romero was elected to represent the Ancash region in Congress three times (1985-1990, 1990-1992, and 2001-2006). He presided over the Committee on Energy and Mines during the last session (2005-2006),and the Committee on Production and Small-Medium Enterprises from 2002-2003. He introduced numerous bills related to the energy/mining sector during his legislative career, including: reducing the sulfur content of diesel fuel, rural electrification, reforming the electric sector concessions and reforming the Camisea Natural Gas project's Socioeconomic Development Fund (FOCAM). He was also key in introducing the controversial bill ordering the tax agency SUNAT to require all mining companies to pay royalties even if they had a tax stability agreement (President Toledo vetoed that bill). He also served as the mayor of El Santa province, Ancash from 1981-1983. ¶6. (U) Valdivia was born in Chimbote, Ancash region, on February 6, 1948, and has been a member of the APRA party since his youth. He graduated as an architect from the Federico Villareal National University (UNFV) in Lima, an APRA stronghold. He is married and has four children, three of whom reside in the U.S. He does not speak English. ¶7. (SBU) Comment: Valdivia is not recognized as a real expert on energy and mining issues, but has a reputation for honesty and belongs to Prime Minister Jorge del Castillo's pro-business faction of the APRA Party. However, Valdivia is a close friend of APRA congressman Jose Carlos CARRASCO Tavara, and has supported Carrasco's well-known statist positions. Valdivia has a well-publicized debt of around one million dollars resulting from a failed agricultural venture, and it was rumored that the debt and associated litigation would prevent President Garcia from naming him minister. End Comment. Transportation & Communications - Veronica Zavala -------------- -------------- ¶8. (U) Veronica ZAVALA Lombardi is a well-known public sector manager. She was twice the Secretary for Public Management for the Presidency of the Council of Ministers (2001-2002 and 2005-2006). She was also the Executive Director of FONAFE (the state holding company for public assets and direction of parastatals, 2000-2001), Manager of the Institutional Reform branch of the Liberty and Democracy Institute, a member of the Directive Council of the National Sanitation Services Authority (SUNASS),Project Director at the Commission for the Promotion of Private Investment (COPRI),and a member of the Market Access and Consumer Protection Committees of INDECOPI (the GOP's competition watchdog and intellectual property office). She is a professor at the Catholic University of Peru (PUCP),the University of San Martin de Porres (SMP),and the University of Applied Sciences (UCA). ¶9. (U) Zavala was born in Lima on February 20, 1967. She has a Master's in Public Administration from Harvard University (1995) and a law degree from the Catholic University of Peru (PUCP, 1990). She has published numerous articles on institutional reform and public administration. ¶10. (U) Zavala is not a member of any political party, but is a recognized public administration expert and the younger sister of the outgoing Minister of Economy and Finance, Fernando Zavala. Housing - Hernan Garrido-Lecca -------------- ¶11. (U) Hernan GARRIDO-LECCA Montanez is a jack-of-all trades, who was an economic advisor during the first Garcia administration. In 1985, at the age of 25, he became the Vice President and CEO of Peru's third largest bank (Interbank, which was then state-owned with 200 branches and 3,000 employees),after which he became the negotiator of Peru's $19 billion foreign debt. He worked as an investment officer for the World Bank's International Financial Corporation (IFC) in Washington, DC from 1989-1992. He then returned to Peru in the midst of the Shining Path insurgency and founded NorAndina, an investment banking services boutique. He later sold his company and took an early retirement at the age of ¶40. ¶12. (U) Garrido-Lecca was a founding member of prestigious consultancy and pollster Apoyo S.A., and President at various times of ProRegiones, Alpamayo Entertainment, Tandem Computers of Peru, Agroindustrial Paramonga, 123remate.com, ECONATURA, ProCallao, Desarrollos Siglo XXI S.A.A, Telecable S.A.A., Bembos S.A.C., Agricola San Juan S.A.A., and various banks and financial institutions. ¶13. (U) Garrido-Lecca has also been a researcher for the Analysis for Development Group (GRADE); a print, radio and television journalist (one of his TV shows was shut down during Fujimori's authoritarian administration); an economics professor at the University of the Pacific (UP) and the University of San Martin de Porres (USMP); and a narrator and award-winning poet. He even worked as the executive director of a motion picture, forayed into graphic design and created a commemorative postage stamp, thought up several prize-winning inventions (he is President of the Peruvian Society of Inventors),and has been a leader of the consumers' rights movement in Peru since 1989. Garrido-Lecca led the April 1998 nation-wide "telephone strike" which forced the GOP and the telephone company to open the market for competition. ¶14. (U) Garrido-Lecca was born in Lima on May 18, 1960. His academic degrees are impressive -- a Master's in Public Administration from Harvard University, a Master's in Science and Technology Policy from MIT, an undergraduate business degree from UP (1981),a Master's in Peruvian and Latin American Literature from the National Major University of San Marcos, and a Ph.D. (candidate) in Administration from the University of Seville, Spain. He has published over a dozen books on economics, science and technology, and consumers' rights. His most recent passion has been authoring children's books, which have won prizes, with one adapted into a successful theatrical play. He is a long-time member of Garcia's APRA party, but ran for Congress in 2001 with the Union por el Peru (UPP) party because of a temporary falling-out with Garcia. STRUBLE