Fourth Annual “Building a Competitive U.S.-Mexico Border” Conference

WHEN: Wednesday, June 14, 2017

WHERE: 6th Floor Auditorium, Wilson Center

Click to RSVP.

The Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute and the Border Trade Alliance are pleased to invite you to our fourth annual high-level “Building a Competitive U.S.-Mexico Border” conference, which will focus on improving border management in order to strengthen the competitiveness of both the United States and Mexico. Specific emphasis will be put on a cooperative bilateral framework, border and transportation infrastructure, binational economic development, and the need for efforts that simultaneously support security and efficiency in border management.

      

Confirmed Speakers*

Governor Doug Ducey, Governor of the State of Arizona

Senator John Cornyn, Texas Majority Whip and Charmain, Subcomittee on International Trade, Customs, and Global Competitiveness

Commissioner (Acting) Kevin McAleenan, U.S. Customs and Border Protection

Congressman Henry Cuellar, (TX- 28)

Alan Bersin, Global Fellow, Wilson Center & Former Commissioner, U.S. Customs and Border Protection

Russell Jones, Chairman, Border Trade Alliance

Michael C. Camuñez, President & CEO, ManattJones Global Strategies & Former Assistant Secretary of Commerce, International Trade Administration

Carlos Marin, CEO, Ambiotec Group, Board Member, United Brownsville

Christopher Wilson, Deputy Director, Mexico Institute

Duncan Wood, Director, Mexico Institute

* A detailed agenda and additional speakers will be added 

Click to RSVP

  Thanks to Our Partners 

 

  

 

America Can Compete Successfully

1/23/2017 Medium

By Earl Anthony Wayne, Public Policy Fellow & Advisory Board Member, Mexico Institute

Much national debate over the last year has been about how the United States, its companies and its workers can compete successfully in the world. The theme was clear in President Trump’s inaugural speech. And, most observers agree that America has what it takes to succeed, but it needs to deploy an array of improved policies and tools to face global competition. We must draw on the best ideas from across the political spectrum and agree on a comprehensive strategy.

Some seek to push ahead aggressively on select reforms without trying to build a broader coalition. Yet there is clear potential for President Trump and his allies to forge wider agreement around an ambitious agenda for making the United States more competitive globally. Agreements that cross party lines would make it more likely that the programs America needs to excel in global markets are enacted, funded and well implemented.

Read more…

Despite fears, Mexico’s manufacturing boom is lifting U.S. workers

08/21/2016 Los Angeles Times

Enrique Zarate, 19, had spent just a year in college when he landed an apprenticeship at a new BMW facility in San Luis Potosí, Mexico. If he performs well, in a year he’ll win a well-paid position, with benefits, working with robots at the company’s newest plant.

Within a decade or so, most of the BMW 3 series cars that Americans buy will probably come from Mexico, built by people like Zarate.

“When you start with such little experience, and get such a big salary, it’s unbelievable,” says Zarate, whose father is a taxi driver and whose mother is a housewife.

Read more…

Mexico Sitting on Untapped Entrepreneurial Talent

07/20/2016 Gallup

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Entrepreneurial talent — an individual’s innate potential to successfully create businesses and jobs — can be found in every postal code in Mexico. But many of these individuals are not being identified and developed.

Just over one in four adults living in Mexico are employed full time for an employer, which is about average for Latin America, but it highlights a disappointing gap between the current state of Mexico’s economy and its potential. The lack of “good jobs” could stem from the sizable informal economy, uncompetitive wages and sparse access to training, development and higher education.

Read more…

BBVA selects 56 startups to compete in Open Talent innovation contest

08/08/2016 Finextra

The finalists of the 8th edition of the BBVA Open Talent contest were announced today. They will compete in three separate finals in Mexico, London and New York in September.

Startup Musoni and its microfinance solution won the BBVA Open Talent 2016 special Financial Award. Musoni has developed a system that leverages technology to help financial institutions optimize their microfinance services, boost efficiency, improve cost-effectiveness and broaden their reach in rural areas where most of the population remains unbanked.

Read more…

Mexico has a master plan to increase its competitiveness through greater connectivity: Enrique Peña Nieto

07/22/2016 Gob.mx

57 of the 80 federal highways, with a length of 2,000 kilometers, have been modernized or expanded, and inaugurated.

• Road works do not arise spontaneously; they are part of a plan to define what will allow our country to continue to grow and drive its development, he said.
• 28,000 kilometers of rural roads have been built during this administration, he said.
• In the State of Mexico, he inaugurated the Ecatepec-Santa Clara stretch of the Mexico-Pachuca highway and the Toluca-La Marquesa stretch of the Mexico-Toluca road.
• He celebrated his 50th birthday inaugurating infrastructure projects and meeting commitments.

Read more…

The United States and Mexico: Building and Designing Things Together

2/24/2016 The Mexico Institute, Forbes.com

By E. Anthony Wayne and Sergio M. Alcocer

14,800 container trucks cross the U.S.-Mexico border each day. They carry much of the $1.6 billion in daily trade that makes Mexico the third largest economic partner and the second largest export market of the U.S., and that makes the U.S. Mexico’s top economic partner.  Mexico is the largest international buyer for some 23 U.S. states, and the U.S. buys about 80% of Mexico’s exports.  

These facts indicate why Vice President Biden, three cabinet secretaries and other U.S. officials will be in Mexico City February 25 meeting Mexican counterparts, led by Secretary of Finance Videgaray, for the U.S.-Mexico High Level Economic Dialogue.  Biden and others will check progress on the dozens of areas where the two governments have been working since 2013 to make it less costly and more efficient to trade between us and to build things together as we compete with other global producers.

Read more…