Presidents from four Andean countries on Tuesday agreed to ask the United States to extend trade preferences for a year.

The agreement was reached at the end of a summit in Quito among senior officials from Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, the four member states of the Andean Community, which once also included Chile and Venezuela.

The existing U.S. trade preferences scheme, the Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act (ATPDEA), will expire in December this year. The ATPDEA was designed to help Andean countries counter the cocaine trade.

During the summit, presidents of the Andean Community of Nations (CAN) signed the Quito Declaration.

The extension of the trade preferences, which seeks to stabilize trade terms between the Andean nations and the Untied States, is an essential measure for the four countries to negotiate new deals, the Declaration said.

The summit was a first step towards overcoming the recent crisis created by Venezuela's decision to leave the trade bloc.

Source: Xinhua