CCB promotes better investment and business climate with launch of international arbitration school in Colombia

• With this initiative CCB takes the first step to becoming the International Arbitration Court of the Americas.
• Nine lawyers will participate in the first course, to be held from March 19 to May 24, from Uruguay, Honduras, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama and Bolivia along with 15 from Colombia.
• This initiative aims to offer integrated training to Latin American lawyers who wish to become successful international arbitrators.

(Bogota, April 19, 2010).- The existence of adequate regional mechanisms for dispute settlement and professionals specialized in arbitration facilitate the processes of integration, attracting investments and improving the business climate.

For this reason, the Arbitration and Conciliation Center (CAC) of the Bogota Chamber of Commerce, the institution with the greatest recognition and tradition in this area in Latin America, will launch tomorrow the International Arbitration School in collaboration with the Spanish Solventia Foundation and CAF financing.

The aim of the initiative is to promote in the international sphere a culture of peaceful settlement of commercial disputes as a means of strengthening the commercial relations of Latin America with the rest of the world. CAC alone processes over 250 cases of commercial arbitration every year.

The School will train Latin American arbitrators as international experts with a global view, thus creating lists of highly qualified arbitrators in the region with international recognition.

This project is a response to the needs of the globalized world where international commercial disputes require means and forms that are easily adapted to the realities of modern society.

Although Ibero-America has outstanding international arbitrators, their representation in the global world of arbitrators is still low compared with other regions of the world with more tradition and culture in this area. This situation means that disputes which involve Ibero-American countries are settled by arbitrators from other continents, highly qualified academically, but culturally distant from the language and view of the Hispanic world.

The idea of the International Arbitration School is to strengthen international arbitration in Latin American countries as a specialized, expedite and effective mechanism for dispute settlement in the world of international trade.

The International Arbitration School will start activities this year with a cycle of three courses for lawyers aged 30 to 45 from various Latin American countries. Total investment for the course is 10,000 euros which includes air tickets, lodging, food and course materials.

The organizing bodies will subsidize 9,000 euros of the total cost of the investment, leaving the student to pay only 1,000 euros. Participants in the first diploma course have already been selected by open competition by CAC and the Solventia Foundation, and published in the pages of chambers of commerce, Latin American universities, law firms and others. Entries closed on February 5, 2010.

The 24 selected students include nine professionals from Uruguay, Honduras, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama and Bolivia, along with 15 Colombians: 10 from Bogota and five from Medellin.

The first diploma course consists of three segments covering a total of 153 hours following the B-Learning methodology. Two of the segments are virtual, during which students will have tutorials, forums and virtual evaluations which go deeper into various subjects; and a face-to-face phase where participants attend classes with highly qualified teachers and arbitrators from Spain, Panama, Peru, England and Colombia, who are also expert in the various subjects selected.

Students who pass the course receive an academic accreditation from CAC with the endorsement of the Solventia Foundation in international arbitration.

How to participate

The call for entries for the second and third diploma courses in 2010, which closes on May 29 and September 17, respectively, will be published in various media, webpages of chambers of commerce, universities, Latin American embassies, and on the webpage of the Arbitration and Conciliation Center of the Bogota Chamber of Commerce. and others.

Candidates must be qualified practicing lawyers with over five years experience, nationality of a Latin American or Caribbean country, aged 30 to 45, with mastery of spoken and written English, and specific experience or studies in arbitration.

People interested should fill out the registration form for the course which can be downloaded from www.cacccb.org.co and then send it to boletincac@ccb.org.co