Shortly after taking office in January, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro hit the ground running on his ambitious effort to boost economic growth by significantly altering the trade policy of the Common Market of the South (Mercosur). Bolsonaro has pushed to amend the bloc’s charter , which currently requires unanimity among Mercosur's four full members — Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay — to negotiate and sign bilateral free trade agreements with other nations and blocs. In trying to persuade the other member states to back his proposed reform, Bolsonaro has assured them that allowing individual trade deals would open up foreign trade and investment opportunities for not only Brazil, but the entire Mercosur bloc . His government has also called for a sharp reduction in the bloc’s tariffs, which would allow more foreign businesses to both enter and take a greater share of the domestic markets within the bloc.