Mexico’s new President Enrique Peña Nieto has started his six-year presidency with a bang. Not only has he struck a ‘grand bargain’ with the two opposition parties, but only months after inauguration the most powerful and most corrupt woman in Mexico, former head of the National Education Workers Union, Elba Esther Gordillo was arrested.
It’s a great time for the U.S. to address immigration. Not only because it makes good political theater against a backdrop of changing electoral demographics, but because Mexicans are staying home.
If your company has been sitting on the sidelines waiting for some semblance of certainty to return to the U.S. economy it could be a long wait. Instead of yet another ‘wait and see’ year, now might be the time to grasp new opportunities and expand into overseas markets.
“Without a doubt, more than ever, the world needs today the sum of talents, the sum of ideas to explore alternatives, to find innovative solutions that will enable the international economy to deal with the challenges it faces, to recover its balance and to get back onto the path of growth.” With these words, Mexican President Calderón launched Mexico’s presidency of the G-20.
World Trade Week 2011 came and went. Despite the Obama administration’s pledge to double U.S. exports by 2015, the pending U.S. FTAs with South Korea, Colombia and Panama continue to be held hostage due to political in-fighting.
As global economic growth begins to pick up, there are decidedly two types of trains on the move – the steam locomotive (most of the world’s developed economies) and the bullet train (high-growth emerging markets).
On April 6 – 11, Mexico will play host to one of the largest US government-led trade missions in recent history. Over 100 U.S. companies have decided to look beyond the narco-violence headlines and fly to Mexico City where they will attend a conference, meet with top US government trade experts from 14 countries…
In the days leading up to his visit to Washington, D.C., Mexican President Felipe Calderón expressed increasing frustration with comments made by U.S. diplomats in Mexico (made public by WikiLeaks) noting colorfully that “Embajadores le echan mucha crema a sus tacos.”
As anyone who has lived in a foreign country and tried to learn the local language knows, there is a time when you start to think you’re really getting it, when suddenly you realize that what you’ve really just figured out is when to nod at the right times. This same feeling of being ‘lost in translation’ also applies to everyday business people trying to navigate the increasingly complex G-world.
Despite the daily flow of news headlines about declining security and increasing battles between the Mexican police and drug cartels, Mexico has not fallen off of the business and international credibility radar screen. In fact, the World Bank, in its “Doing Business 2011” report, ranked Mexico 35th out of 183 economies (moving up 6 places from last year) and 1st out of 32 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean – well ahead of the region’s largest economy, Brazil.