Mexican News
The latest news from and about Mexican issues.Thursday, August 07, 2008
Drooping dollar makes Mexican vacations more expensive.
USA Today, August 7, 2008 - “The plunging U.S. dollar has already forced many Americans to give up vacations in Europe. Now, the dollar has lost nearly 10% against the Mexican peso since January — meaning that beach trips to sunny spots south of the border are becoming out of reach, too. The dollar’s value had been stable for years in Mexico, even as it fell against other currencies such as the euro. The shift could have a significant effect on tourism and the $347 billion in trade between Mexico and the United States.” Read more.
Wednesday, August 06, 2008
Mexico’s Oil Referendum.
Foreign Policy in Focus, August 6, 2008 - “Mexico is engaged in one of the most pivotal debates in its modern history: the future of its oil industry. The question is whether oil operations should remain in state hands or be privatized. Mexico exported 1.1 million barrels of oil per day to the United States in 2007, making it the third-largest supplier of oil to the United States, after Canada and Saudi Arabia. Yet the U.S. media has paid scant attention to the debate over what will happen with Mexico’s most important industry.” Read more.
Mexico businesses tighten security against drugs.
Reuters, August 6, 2008 - “Businesses in Mexico are tightening security against drug gangs that sneak narcotics into export shipments to the United States and have turned manufacturing centers on the U.S. border into battlegrounds. A vicious war between rival gangs and security forces has killed a record 1,900 people in Mexico so far this year. The violence has hardly damaged the broad economy but several recent embarrassing incidents where illegal drugs were found hidden within the cargo shipments of major exporters have put executives on edge.” Read more.
Tuesday, August 05, 2008
Mexico’s Calderon closer to energy reform deal.
Reuters UK, August 5, 2008 - “President Felipe Calderon is closing in on an energy reform that could give a shot in the arm to Mexico’s struggling oil industry, but it is not clear if oil majors will be lured into crucial deep-water projects. It is Calderon’s most ambitious economic reform attempt yet but the left-wing opposition and many ordinary Mexicans are wary of private involvement in the cherished oil sector, which has been in state hands since 1938. Calderon, a conservative, lacks a majority in Congress but a centrist opposition party expects to reach a deal with the government in the coming weeks to approve a reform.” Read more.
Official: Mexico open to new NAFTA talks.
Truth about Trade & Technology, August 2, 2008 - “The Mexican government dismisses talk of disbanding NAFTA as politics, the country’s economy minister said Friday, but it would back the idea of a new round of North American trade talks, with the aim of including issues such as the environment and labor. Eduardo Sojo, in Chicago this week to address the U.S.-Mexican Chamber of Commerce, was responding to criticism of the 15-year-old trade accord that resurfaced during the Democratic presidential primaries this year. ‘What we do believe that we need in the region, in North America, is more integration, not less integration,’ Sojo said in an interview with the Tribune.” Read more.
Monday, August 04, 2008
FactBox: Mexico energy reform debate.
Reuters, August 4, 2008 - “Latest developments as Mexico’s ruling conservatives court opposition lawmakers to approve an energy reform to allow more private investment in the state-controlled oil industry in hopes of bolstering falling output. Compiled from Reuters stories, Mexican newspaper reports, television and radio. Lawmakers will meet this week to begin talks aimed at finding a compromise between President Felipe Calderon’s reform proposal and a plan hatched by a centrist opposition party, said Sen. Francisco Labastida, president of the Senate energy committee.” Read more.
Doing business in Mexico.
AZ Central, August 4, 2008 - “The rapid economic emergence of China and India has pushed Mexico a bit out of the spotlight. Maquiladora plants have closed as Mexican labor costs got undercut by cheaper workers in Asia. North American Free Trade Agreement issues have taken a backseat to rapid trade expansion with the giant developing countries of Asia. ‘Mexico got hit hard when China joined the World Trade Organization,’ said Roy Nelson, associate professor of international studies at the Thunderbird School of Global Management in Glendale. ‘A lot of low-cost manufacturing operations moved to China.’” Read more.
Sunday, August 03, 2008
Mexican Drug Cartels Out of Control in the U.S. and Mexico.
American Chronicle, August 3, 2008 - “For years now US federal officials have reported that the Mexican drug cartels are operating in dozens of US cities, and have consolidated their control of the entire corridor of the supply chain of illegal drugs from deep in Mexico north to the U.S. border and beyond. Nationwide, the Mexican drug cartels are now the dominant distributors of wholesale quantities of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines and marijuana in the United States. No other group is positioned better to expand there already nationwide operation and take over total distribution of drugs in the south eastern part of the country too, then are the Mexican drug cartels as they now do in the south western part of the country.” Read more.
Saturday, August 02, 2008
$850 Million in Ex-Im Bank Guarantees Support U.S. Oil & Gas Field Development Exports to Mexico
7thSpace, August 2, 2008 - “U.S. companies large and small will sustain jobs at home while helping Mexico meet its domestic natural gas demand through the sale of oil and gas field equipment and services to Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex), backed by $850 million in loan guarantees from the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank). Ex-Im Bank approved a $150 million small business facility supporting Pemex’s purchase of U.S. equipment and services to speed recovery of oil and gas reserves at Pemex’s four major projects - Cantarell, Burgos Basin, the New Pidiregas Projects (NPP), and the Strategic Gas Program (PEG). Under the facility, Pemex already has contracted for $100 million in purchases, all of them from U.S. small businesses, and expects a significant share of the remaining $50 million to support contracts with small U.S. firms.” Read more.
Dug in over oil.
LA Times, August 2, 2008 - “The results of a recent referendum on permitting foreign investment in the state oil company are the latest indication that Mexican President Felipe Calderon is having a hard time selling his energy reform plan. Between 80% and 90% of voters shot down a proposal he has touted as vital to his country’s future. True, the nonbinding referendum was a stunt staged by the left-wing Democratic Revolution Party to garner headlines and rattle Calderon and his National Action Party, and turnout was negligible.” Read more.
NAMI publishes a monthly e-newsletter of trinational and organizational news. If you would like to keep up with NAMI, trinational issues and NAMI's exclusive events, click here to sign up today.
