U.S. Surface Transportation Trade with Mexico
U.S.–Mexico surface transportation trade totaled $23.9 billion in November, up 4.4 percent compared to November 2008. The value of imports carried by truck was 11.5 percent higher in November 2009 than November 2008 while the value of exports carried by truck was 1.7 percent higher.
Producer Groups Push to Open Mexican Border to Trucking
Trade groups representing products ranging from farm to factory are pressuring the Obama administration and Congress to reinstate a Mexican cross-border trucking program to end Mexico’s retaliatory tariffs that cost U.S. businesses millions of dollars in lost revenue.
U.S., Mexico Set Cross-Border Transportation Working Group
Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and his Mexican counterpart have agreed to form a working group to consider the next steps of the two countries’ cross-border trucking program.
LaHood and Mexican Secretary of Communications and Transportation Juan Molinar Horcasitas discussed a broad range of transportation issues of fundamental economic interest to both countries, the two said in an e-mailed statement late Monday.
Meeting in Monterrey, Mexico, the two agreed on the importance of cooperating in areas of mutual interest to ensure the safety, reliability, efficiency and sustainability of the two countries’ transportation systems.
The officials said they recognized the “critical role of border region transportation infrastructure projects in sustaining a mutually important trade relationship” and committed to establishing processes to increase bilateral transportation cooperation.
Last month a group of 56 U.S. lawmakers urged the Obama administration to resolve the ongoing cross-border trucking dispute with Mexico they said has damaged bilateral trade.
Mexican trucks are allowed to operate in a zone of about 25 miles on the American side of the U.S.-Mexico border. Under the Bush administration, the Department of Transportation began a pilot program in 2007 to allow some Mexican carriers free access to all U.S. roads.
