Guadalajara, Jal. The association of the Maquiladora and Export Manufacturing Industry (Index) Oeste, considers that the goal of substituting imports is perfectly viable so that in the year 2030, 15% of everything the industry consumes is produced in Mexico as long as provide support so that SMEs are competitive on a global level, in accordance with the Mexico Plan presented last week by President Claudia Sheinbaum.
The president of the association, Guillermo del Río, said that small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) will have a real opportunity to join the supply chain of large global companies, assured the president of the Maquiladora and Manufacturing Industry association. Export (Index) West.
“What we said is that we have to put our SMEs to compete on a global level; So, part of what this plan contemplates is, for example, giving clean and cheaper energy to SMEs, giving them access to cheaper financing, which is a program that will be released in the following months, and we also have to bring machinery ”said Del Río Ochoa.
According to the president of Index Oeste, for companies in that sector, purchasing inputs from local suppliers is between 20 and 30% more expensive than importing them from China.
“We go and do the study and we see that SMEs that have the opportunity normally have very expensive low voltage energy, they do not have good financing and they have to go buy materials at a very high cost without economies of scale; It is a lot of work to invest in machinery, when they get financing they are getting between 15 and 20% interest even though they are doing well, when the competition is in single digits,” he explained.
“We would be willing to pay a little more to have it nearby, but we can’t go for 30% because they take us out of the market,” he emphasized.
Strategy
The leader proposed that specific strategies be implemented for each commodity in the import substitution plan.
“I give an example: high precision machining, there are many workshops here in Mexico; We brought the steel from China and now it costs 30 to 35% more due to the new tariff; You cannot get it in Mexico because it is not manufactured and we just made the product more expensive. Many workshops could use their machinery and I believe that if we work together with the Ministry of Economy and all the actors, we can make precision shots per commodity,” he explained.
Guillermo del Río stated that Index is actively participating in Plan Mexico, specifically “evaluating which commodities or in which parts we can look for economies of scale or buy volume and begin to substitute imports and perhaps invite manufacturers to come to invest here in Mexico.” of those parties or that they associate with a company, or import the technology.”
Likewise, he added that the Index industries throughout the country buy on average 8% of their supplies in Mexico, while “in Jalisco we are above the average, we are close to 15%, but always having the closest supply is very good and I believe that this program will greatly benefit both importers and exporters and the national economy.”
