Renewed Focus on Border Security is Chance to Improve U.S.-Mexico Trade, Advocacy Group Says
Bilateral trade with Mexico supports 6 million U.S. jobs, reaching an estimated $535.9 billion in 2012, according to a recent report from the center-left think tank NDN (here). The report said that 23 U.S. states have Mexico as their number one or two trading partner. Forty-seven land ports of entry between the two countries process several hundreds of billions of dollars in trade every year, the report said. Released as Congress spotlights the border -- mark up of the Senate comprehensive immigration reform bill starts May 8 -- the report recommends funding additional CBP officers and improving infrastructure at the borders to leverage trade from North American Free Trade Agreement in light of upcoming free trade agreements, like the EU-U.S. pact. The report also recommends the development of “key U.S.-Mexico trade metric” to policymakers and the public can better understand what the government is doing on trade at the border.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
The U.S.-Mexico trade relationship is an "economic force that all of us need to appreciate and understand better," said report author Erik Lee of Arizona State University's North American Center for Transborder Studies in a statement. "President Obama's extensive references to this enormous economic relationship last week essentially confirmed what we have known for years: the U.S.-Mexico relationship is essentially a commercial relationship, rather a security-based relationship. We have a window of opportunity to increase this economic bonanza that includes key legislation (including immigration reform), new trade agreements and important pending infrastructure investments to facilitate trade and tourism. If we can get this done, we can set the stage for tremendous future shared prosperity."