Alma E. Muñoz and Alonso Urrutia
La Jornada newspaper
Thursday, October 2, 2025, p. 8
The Federal Government seeks to reach an agreement with the company Calizas Industriales del Carmen (Calica), subsidiary of Vulcan Materials, before the international arbitration they requested. One possibility is to buy them the land of the limestone mine or the concession of the port, President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo reported.
On the table, he said, it is maintained that the area – located in Quintana Roo – is used, for example, for low impact tourism, but that mine “can no longer be exploited.”
He also pointed out that Government coordinates a dialogue group with Grupo México to guarantee the cleaning of the Sonora River and the soil, as well as complying with the works that were unfinished after damage to the toxic spill in 2014.
In the town of the town, he informed that they dialogue with Calica to reach an agreement. “All viabilities are being analyzed to try to reach an agreement before international arbitration”; Among them is “already at the end, how much would it cost to buy the land or the concession of the port.” That mine, he stressed, “can no longer be exploited, is our decision.”
He said that the Material Vulcan subsidiary has the port and the mine, of which “they took out the material to export to the United States”, but “as they had violated the environmental impact and were exploiting more than they had authorized, President López Obrador decides – because there is no agreement at that time – decreeing natural natural area that area, so that it is prevented from being exploited.”
The president also indicated that in the case of the Sonora River, the head of the Interior, Rosa Icela Rodríguez, coordinates the dialogue with Grupo México. “There has to guarantee the cleaning of the tributary, from the ground, as well as a clinic that was in half, a laboratory to be permanently analyzing the quality of the water, and apart is the issue of the mine, of the miners.”
All this is working with Grupo México, based on what communities have been requesting, and “see if the company agrees” to compensate for all the damages caused.
He recalled that before leaving the presidency, Enrique Peña Nieto closed the trust where resources were deposited for works, so “there were many pending things.”
Thus, “it is in dialogue in a very open, transparent way, seeking to meet what the communities request.”
He also stressed that there are no new mining concessions, but permits for the exploitation of existing veins.
