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Mexican employers offer fewer positions to jobseekers who lack adequate skills
Submitted by mexbiznews on Thu, 07/23/2009 - 8:57am
El Economista
and The News
Levels of unemployment in the country not only remain at rates above 5 percent, but could be worse for 2010, mainly because the labor force will increase and the market cannot absorb the labor force will reach generate.
Moreover, accorting to a global survey by Manpower, Mexico ranks sixth in the world as having the most problems in the recruitment of workers due to a lack of skills.
Mexico's Manpower public relations director Laura García said that 44 percent of Mexico's employers indicated they had had a difficult time hiring people, up 16 percent from last year.
"What's ironic is that, globally, there is a decreased demand for workers due to the economic recession, and so we expected it would be easier to hire talent, but the opposite has happened," she said.
The worst is yet to come, say experts who predict a drastic fall in production in the second half of the year that will continue through early 2010, which will cause a greater loss of jobs and increase the unemployment rate.
Immigration from Mexico to the United States declines to lowest level in a decade
Submitted by mexbiznews on Wed, 07/22/2009 - 7:12am
AFP
The number of Mexican immigrants who came to the United States has fallen sharply, hitting a 10-year low in the 12 months ending in March, a Pew Hispanic Center report showed Wednesday.
Between March 2008 to March 2009, the "estimated annual inflow of immigrants from Mexico was lower than at any point during the decade," bottoming out at about 175,000 immigrants, the report said, citing data from the US Census Bureau's Current Population Survey.
In the previous two years, the number of immigrants crossing from Mexico to the United States was around twice that figure, the report said.
The report notes that statistics from Mexico's National Survey of Employment and Occupation (ENOE) showed that the immigrant flow from Mexico to the United States has fallen by around 20 percent a year since 2006, from more than a million people in the 12 months starting February 2006 to 814,000 for the same period in 2007-2008 and to 636,000 in 2008-2009.
The Mexican figures were markedly higher than the US census figures because the Mexican data covers a broad spread of migrants while the US figures track only people whose principal residence is in the United States.
A third of all foreign-born US residents and two-thirds of Hispanic immigrants to the United States come from Mexico, the report said.
Nearly everyone who leaves Mexico heads for the United States, which is currently home to one in 10 people who were born in Mexico.
www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5haUqtp5Ss-TnZfrcV2V0ja0r-hxQ
Ex-President Fox fined for transforming ranch to hotel without obtaining permits
Submitted by mexbiznews on Tue, 07/21/2009 - 7:12am
Xochitl Alvarez
El Universal
No building, land use or enviornmental impact permits have been given to former Mexican President Vicente Fox for the transformation of his San Cristobal ranch into a luxury hotel and meeting center, says Juan Gabriel Renteria, director of urban development for the municipality of San Francisco del Rincon, Guanajuato.
Therefore, the official announced that the former president will be fined 250,000 pesos ($18,867) for undertaking the work without official authorization.
On Monday, Marta Sahagun refused to discuss the hotel and the lack of municipal permits.
"There are more important issues to deal with," she said.
In a statement, the meeting enter reported that Fox was merely remodeling the original rooms of the ranch.
But Rentería said city staff went to San Cristobal and confirmed the construction of eight cottages.
More than 47 percent of Mexico's population lives in poverty
Submitted by mexbiznews on Mon, 07/20/2009 - 6:14am
El Economista
More than fifty million Mexicans live in poverty, 47.4 percent of the population, according to a report released Monday by the Government of National Assessment of Social Policy Development (Coneval).
Between 2006 and 2008, the percentage of the poor has risen almost 5 percent. In total. 50,6 millon of Mexico's 107 million people cannot meet their needs for health care, education, food, shelter, clothing and public transport, according to the study.
Figures for 2008 show an almost 5 percent increase - or an additional 5.1 million - who have fallen into the ranks of the impoverished since 2006.
According to statistics, 7.2 million people lacking enough money for food live in urban areas of Mexico (towns of 15,000 or more inhabitants), while 12.2 million live in rural areas of the country.
eleconomista.com.mx/notas-online/politica/2009/07/19/pobreza-474-poblacion-mexico
Mexicans have ongoing fears about the country's economy, security, government
Submitted by mexbiznews on Sat, 07/18/2009 - 7:13am
By Fernando Franco
El Economista
Eight of every 10 Mexicans say it is "difficult" at this time to save money or pay their debts, according to a study conducted by the consulting firm De La Riva.
Called "In times of crisis, how to respond to consumer needs", the study does not offer much hope. It found people's expectations regarding social, political and economic issues in the coming months are the same or worse.
According to the survey, nearly 70 percent of respondents expected that within a year Mexico will be increasingly ungovernable.
In addition, 66 percent expected insecurity will grow, while 59 percent anticipated a rise in unemployment.
"This presents a new Mexico, one in which people are very vulnerable to any shock. The reaction is more emotional and less rational, more demanding and more rough," said Roberto Valdes, the company's vice president of technical research.
eleconomista.com.mx/notas-online/finanzas/2009/07/17/%E2%80%9Cno-pagare-mis-deudas%E2%80%9D-ocho-cada-10-mexicanos
U.S. security firms vie for Mexican drug war work
Submitted by mexbiznews on Fri, 07/17/2009 - 6:08am
By Mica Rosenberg
Reuters
As Mexico battles to keep a lid on raging drug war violence, U.S. companies are fighting over millions of dollars in contracts for military equipment and training under a long-promised U.S aid package.
Private U.S. security firms will get the bulk of a $1.4 billion package pledged by the United States in 2007 to help its southern neighbor crush rampant drug gang carnage. Only a fraction of the aid has been delivered so far.
Almost all of an initial $400 million tranche approved by the U.S. Congress in 2008 and being released bit by bit to buy helicopters and inspection gear and train Mexican police will be doled out to 30 or 40 U.S. companies, said a U.S. embassy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The state-of-the art equipment is badly needed in Mexico as the death toll from a 2 1/2-year drug war tops 12,800.
"We would love to get in on some of that Merida money," said Scott Newman, an executive from Texas firm Texcalibur, which specializes in bulletproofing cars used in war zones.
Canadian, Mexican businesses complain about costs of new visa requirement
Submitted by mexbiznews on Thu, 07/16/2009 - 7:36am
From El Economista, The Canadian Press and CBC News
As the number of Mexicans seeking visas to travel to Canada swelled to 1,000 at the Canadian Embassy in Mexico City Wednesday, business groups in the two countries complained about the costs of the new Canadian program to require visas of visitors from Mexico and the Czech Republic.
Calling on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to intervene to request that the program be postponed until the end of August, Mexico's Confederation of Industrial Chambers (Concamin) issued a statement saying the rule represents an obstacle to business relations between entrepreneurs of both countries and for trade relations.
The new requirement will especially hurt those in the airline and tourism industries as well as Mexicans who will need to travel to Mexico City to process the visa, it said.
In Toronto, some businesses said the visa requirement will have an immediate and detrimental effect. Andrew Weir of Tourism Toronto said the requirement will especially hurt tourism from Mexico.
Over the past five years visitors from Mexico to Toronto have surpassed Japanese and German tourists and now hold the No. 3 spot for visitors to the city. The Canadian tourism industry says Mexcians accounted for 266,000 visitors last year.
Uproar over Canadian visa requirement grows
Submitted by mexbiznews on Wed, 07/15/2009 - 6:59am
By Karla Fajardo
RUMBO de México
The Canadian government's announcement late Monday that it now requires Mexican citizens to have a visa to enter Canada was received with outrage by politicians and bewilderment by would-be travelers and tourists to Canada.
The news was ill-received in the Mexican Congress, where deputies from the three leading parties demanded "equal treatment" to Canadian citizens coming to Mexico.
The visa requirement was also imposed on the Czech Republic, which responded to the decision by recalling its ambassador Tuesday and said it will require Candians to have a visa when they enter the Czech Republic.
The Foreign Relations secretary in the Mexican Chamber of Deputies, Cuauhtemoc Sandoval, of the Party of the Democratic Revolution, accused the Canadian government of an "anti-Mexican policy" and demanded that the measure to impose a visa on Mexicans should be withdrawn immediately.
More flexibility needed at border, says U.S. think-tank
Submitted by mexbiznews on Tue, 07/14/2009 - 5:42am
By Donald McArthur
Windsor Star
Responsibility for congested border crossings should be decentralized to allow for greater local flexibility and distinct groups of travellers should be handled differently depending on their level of risk, says a report released Monday by a U.S. think-tank.
The report, authored by Chris Sands of the Hudson Institute and commissioned by the Brookings Institution, is critical of the "one-size-fits-all" security approach embraced by the U.S. following the Sept. 11 attacks and urges Washington to treat its border with Canada differently than its border with Mexico.
"The unfortunate reality is that the border today remains a source of considerable user frustration and economic drag," said the report. "Progress requires taking greater account of the variety of ways in which the border is used by different categories of users in different places."
The report also discusses the pivotal role an unfettered border plays in the just-in-time delivery systems of North American manufacturers and suggests enhanced mobility at the border could speed an economic recovery, boosting the automotive sector, in particular.
www.canada.com/travel/More+flexibility+needed+border+think+tank/1787247/story.html
Mexico City expected to recover tourists this summer
Submitted by mexbiznews on Mon, 07/13/2009 - 11:28am
El Economista
Mexico City Tourism Secretary Alejandro Rojas Díaz Durán said that tourism is expected to recover 90 percent of its regular activity during the summer.
He predicts nearly 2 million people will visit the capital, making it the premier tourist destination in the country.
Of those who travel to Mexico City, 24 percent routinely come from other nation and 63 percent are from elsewhere in Mexico.
Rojas Durán Díaz said he will meet with the country's tourism secretary, Rodolfo Elizondo Torres, to create programs to support promotion of Mexico City tourism in international and national markets because the federal district was most affected by a drop in visitors because of this spring's flu outbreak.
eleconomista.com.mx/notas-online/df/2009/07/12/gdf-preve-recuperar-90-actividad-turistica
