Bill 178.

Summary.

The bill establishes principles of transparency, accountability, legality, public participation, and balance between public and private representatives for agricultural entities funded by the state. It defines fairs and their forms, boards of trustees, the Assembly of Trustees, national producers, the casting vote, and the intervention board. It covers cultural, culinary, craft, industrial, and agricultural exhibitions, and classifies fairs into 3 levels according to their scope and complexity.

It assigns the Ministry of Agricultural Development (Ministerio de Desarrollo Agropecuario) responsibility for directing policies applicable to entities funded with public money. The minister would recognize assemblies of trustees and ratify fair boards of directors. Within the ministry, it creates the National Fairs Commission (Comisión Nacional de Ferias), known as CONAFER, to direct, coordinate, regulate, oversee, and promote fairs in Panama. The commission would prepare and publish the official calendar, review reports, process complaints, and request measures in response to noncompliance. It would include authorities from the agricultural, trade, and tourism sectors, presidents of boards of trustees, and the fairs director. Its board of directors would include fair representatives elected for 2 years. The bill also provides for advisers and members who are not public officials to serve without pay, with reimbursement of documented expenses.

The ministry, known as MIDA, would allocate budget funds to fairs according to their category and the submission of reports, especially financial reports; failure to submit reports would prevent the processing of payments of state contributions. The bill creates the National Fairs Directorate (Dirección Nacional de Ferias) within the ministry. Boards of trustees would manage the events and administer and protect property provided for their use or usufruct, as well as property generated by their activities. They would organize logistics, select exhibitors, schedule activities, comply with applicable rules, and reserve at least 60% of each fair's area for national producers. The rules would apply to existing and future entities that receive state funds, including through other public entities.

Private representatives would serve without pay for a single 2-year term. The bill establishes disqualifications based on contractual ties, family relationships, and participation in the preceding term, as well as prohibitions on contracting with board members or their relatives. Local authorities would be prohibited from authorizing certain sales and similar activities during international and national fairs in the same district within a 3-kilometer radius. The Assembly of Trustees would bring together public and private representatives; the text mentions the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (Ministerio de Comercio e Industrias), the Tourism Authority (Autoridad de Turismo), the Ministry of Culture (Ministerio de Cultura), the Ministry of Social Development (Ministerio de Desarrollo Social), civic associations, and producer organizations. It specifies board of director positions and legal representation, grounds for removal, monthly meetings, quorum, and voting. The Ministry of Economy and Finance (Ministerio de Economía y Finanzas) and the Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic (Contraloría General de la República) would attend meetings with the right to speak. Covered entities would adapt their structures within 1 year.

The bill distinguishes activity reports, financial reports, and board administration reports. They would be submitted, respectively, 1 month or 30 days after the fair, 2 months or 60 days after it, and annually on December 31, with a different deadline for certain international fairs. The ministry would publish all reports; first- and second-level boards of trustees would also publish them on their websites. Anyone could file a complaint about noncompliance. The ministry could suspend, intervene in, or dissolve boards of trustees and adopt corrective, restrictive, or expansive measures. The Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic would conduct audits and, if it found a loss to public assets, the ministry would refer the matter to the Accounts Prosecutor's Office (Fiscalía de Cuentas).

MIDA would have 1 year from promulgation to reorganize fair regulations. The bill states that it complements Law 316 of 2023, repeals conflicting provisions and, expressly, Executive Decree No. 84 of 1997 and its amendments; it would take effect upon promulgation. Given its subject matter, it relates to the Executive Branch (Órgano Ejecutivo), oversight bodies, and the agricultural production, trade, tourism, culture, crafts, and industry sectors.