Mexico Wants Chinese Investment, Ministers Announce at ‘China Day’ Seminar
Jan. 17, 2020 (EIRNS)—Mexico’s Economics Ministry held a huge “China Day” seminar at the Ministry’s International Business Center on Jan. 14 to promote increased trade, investment and economic development between China and Mexico. More than 800 small, medium, and large Mexican companies and producer associations from 25 Mexican states participated, along with 85 Chinese companies and a large delegation of Chinese Embassy officials, led by Ambassador Zhu with Qingqiao. Eleven panels and workshops were held, and 20 information stands organized by various Mexican states and companies promoting areas of potential economic cooperation.
Economics Minister Graciela Marquez, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, and Chinese Ambassador Zhu Qingqiao opened the event, with the two Mexican ministers delivering the message that Chinese companies “are invited to invest in Mexico.”
Ebrard reported that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador had instructed the ministers to maintain a “great dynamism” in bilateral relations with China. Marquez spoke of her ministry’s responsibility to promote exports to China, “probably the most attractive market in the world,” a growing economy whose population has a growing purchasing power.
Marquez further stated that “Mexico is also fertile territory for Chinese capital,” in both traditional and non-traditional sectors. She mentioned that potential Chinese investment in developing the “enormous growth potential” of Mexico’s petrochemical industry had been discussed at a breakfast meeting that morning, but this, she said, is just one example among many opportunities.
Potential Chinese investment in Mexico’s state-run oil industry (which Wall Street has sought to bankrupt and privatize) is a hot one. Ambassador Zhu Qingqiao’s statement at the China Day opening, that the Bank of China and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China were going to invest $600 million in the new refinery that Mexico’s oil company Pemex is building in Dos Bocas, Tabasco dominated media headlines. The Houston Chronicle went so far as to write that no one thinks the refinery can be viable, and if China does invest in it, Beijing should prepare for the $600 million defaulted on!
The media went wild about “contradictions” between Mexico and China after Mexico’s Energy Minister Rocio Nahle told media, cautiously, that she knew nothing about Chinese investment in the publicly funded refinery, the Chinese Embassy issued a statement that there was a “misunderstanding,” and the Ambassador had referred to money loaned to Pemex in 2019 to recapitalize the state company generally.
Schiller Institute organizers attended, and gave copies of Helga Zepp-LaRouche’s Jan. 7 “Call for Presidents Trump, Putin and Xi To Convene Emergency Summit To Address Danger of War” to many key participants at the seminar, raised the need to cooperate on high-speed rail and nuclear energy. The activists urged Mexican officials to organize for Mexico’s participation in the New Silk Road, which is more than a commercial matter.
