Given the complexity, the first review tables of the T-MEC will begin: SE

Aguascalientes, Ags., In the midst of a more complex scenario, the first meetings for the six-year review of the T-MEC will begin on Wednesday of next week, said Luis Rosendo Gutiérrez, undersecretary of Foreign Trade of the Ministry of Economy (SE).

“This month the work tables begin, we are going to start next Wednesday, we are going to Washington to talk with counterparts from both the United States and Canada,” he said in an interview after participating in the 30th Foreign Trade Congress.

The official acknowledged that “the scenario is more complex than in 2018,” when the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA, now TMEC) was modernized.

After reiterating that it will not be a renegotiation, but rather a “very good review of the Treaty,” he commented that among the issues are the rules of origin of the automotive industry, increasing Mexican exports with greater national content and that many of the things that They come from Asia and begin to be produced in Mexico. “That is the challenge we have for the coming years,” he said.

He added that another issue to be discussed is the labor mechanism to make it more expeditious and strengthen the supervision of labor issues, but also the working conditions for Mexicans with the other two partner countries.

He noted that because the United States government is going to change, the first tables for the review of the T-MEC with its counterparts will not be in-depth. However, they will also meet with “key people we have there, importers from Mexico, to see the coalitions we are going to be putting together.”

He stressed that the great priority is to maintain the great benefits in terms of tariffs, maintain the levels of trade with the United States, since Mexico is the first trading partner of the American Union and the treaty has made the region the most prosperous in the world.

Sergio Contreras Pérez, executive president of the Mexican Business Council for Foreign Trade, Investment and Technology (Comce) commented when opening this forum that “there is a lot of concern” about the review of the T-MEC, so the dialogue must begin. “We are North America, the most important economic bloc in the world, we have to make our American and Canadian partners understand that we have to start having this concept of unity and that we are a region, if one of us does well, we do well.” well to all three,” he said.

In the forum where recognition was given to businessman Valentín Diez Morodo, honorary president of Comce, Gutiérrez mentioned that the announcement of investments for more than 20 billion dollars by 2025 made in the CEO Dialogue, the companies confirmed the amount that is already insured, but it is expected to be up to 30 billion pesos initially.

He reiterated that President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo “has a lot of commitment to national and international investment, which is why she guaranteed legal certainty, protecting the capital that is already in the country and those that will come.

“The entire administration is going to be committed to bringing more investments for Mexicans,” the official highlighted.

He added that “Mexico has a historic opportunity to bring investment to our country. We are already seeing it with the relocation, but moving forward we have a great opportunity. The United States wants to bring a good part of its supply chains from Asia to America and Mexico has to become the great factory of the North American region, that’s where we are going.”

“There is a great appetite among American and Mexican investors to create a chip boom in Mexico, so I think there is good news coming for Mexico in the coming years,” said Gutiérrez.