Five Spanish companies from widely differing sectors including culinary training and organic solvent recovery presently are looking for investment opportunities in Puerto Rico.
"We've decided. We want to open a Mediterranean gastronomy school here for foreign students who want to get their training in Spanish and learn about this subject," Angel Eduardo, the head of international development for the Centro de Superior de Hosteleria Mediterranea.
His company decided to open a higher education institute in Puerto Rico in 2016 and now he is seeking a site for the school in the area of Santurce, the nerve center of San Juan, which this businessman already knows well, given that he lived in the island's capital for a number of years.
He is the representative of one of the five firms that has sent top officers to Puerto Rico as part of a trade mission organized by the Economic and Trade Office of the Spanish Consulate in San Juan, the Spanish Institute for Foreign Trade and the Puerto Rico Department of Economic Development.
The mission is also being sponsored by the Spanish Development Financing Company, a public corporation that finances investment projects abroad.
Coming to the island along with Eduardo are Oscar and Carlos Mayoral, both with Quimica de Recuperacion, a company specializing in handling and recyling inorganic solvent waste, and Luis Prous, with Sofos, a renewable energy firm.
Also along on the trade mission is Juncaret, a firm specializing in managing gasoline stations and seeking to conclude agreements with companies in that sector to offer its services on the island, as its representative, Carmelo Toledo, said at a meeting with Puerto Rico's economic development secretary, Alberto Baco.
At the all-day meeting the prospective Spanish investors received information about the island's business advantages and the significant fiscal incentives it provides.
"Puerto Rico is a port of entry for the U.S. and ... Latin America, and that's something that some Spanish companies have already seen, like Banco Santander or the Mapfre insurance firm," Baco told the business executives.
He spoke to them about the "bilingualism and bicultural nature" of the island's labor force and about the U.S. legislation that is relevant within a U.S. commonwealth "where you practically don't have to pay taxes."
Along those lines, his team emphasized that while a company does have to pay taxes amounting to about 56 percent of the profits it obtains in the continental United States when those funds are repatriated, in Puerto Rico the rate is only 4 percent. EFE
By Mar Gonzalo
Spanish firms to explore Puerto Rico with an eye to invest
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