Minimum wage in Colombia up 9.5% in 2025
Colombia’s government decreed a 9.5% minimum wage hike after employers and labor unions failed to reach agreement. The wage hike that will take force in January is significantly higher than…
Economy
Colombia’s congress sinks Petro’s budget finance bill
Colombia’s Congress sunk the government’s budget finance bill, which sought to close a $2.8 billion budget gap. The congressional economy commissions voted to discard the bill weeks after voting against…
Colombia’s Senate agrees to begin decentralizing government
Colombia’s Senate voted to dramatically increase the budgets of regional authorities ahead of a debate to decentralize government. The bill, which has yet to be approved by the House of…
Colombia’s truckers agree to lift blockades after deal with government
Colombia’s transport sector leaders asked truckers to resume work after the government agreed to compromise on fuel price hikes. The government agreed to revoke the $0.26/gallon price hike that triggered…
Truckers shut down parts of Colombia over fuel price hikes
Truckers have begun blocking some of Colombia’s major highways in an attempt to halt government plans to remove subsidies on gasoline. In a statement, the Ombudsman’s Office said that the…
Colombia’s bankers agree to invest additional $13.6B in economic development
Colombia’s banking sector agreed to invest $13.6 billion in sectors that are expected to grow the economy, President Gustavo Petro said Tuesday. The agreement came after a series of meetings…
Poverty in Colombia dropped 6.7 points since 2021
Poverty in Colombia dropped 6.7 percentage points to 33% of the population between 2021 and 2023, according to statistics agency DANE. This means that last year some 15.8 million people…
Chinese mining company sues Colombia over paramilitary violence
The multinational Zijin Mining Group sued Colombia over alleged failures to protect its mining interests from violence by paramilitary group EGC. The lawsuit was filed before the World Bank’s International…
Colombia’s state-run oil company lost more than 5M barrels to thieves since 2019
Ecopetrol and Colombia’s security forces have agreed to coordinate efforts to fight oil theft, which allegedly cost the state-run oil company $936 million (COP3.6 trillion) since 2019. According to Ecopetrol,…