By Kylie Madry
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -Mexican officials on Monday laid out a plan to keep the nation on the path toward growth after narrowly avoiding a technical recession in the first quarter.
The nation’s annual gross domestic product could tick up 0.7 percentage points if the plan goes into effect, Finance Minister Edgar Amador said, speaking alongside President Claudia Sheinbaum at her morning press conference.
Amador said the government plans to boost the national content of government purchases by 10% and swap out 10% of manufacturing imports, along with providing a direct stimulus to internal demand and local producers.
Along with the growth, the measures could create 700,000 new jobs a year, the minister added.
In the first quarter, Mexico’s economy grew 0.2% from the final three months of 2024, reversing a 0.6% contraction in the fourth quarter. A negative first quarter would have put Mexico in what most economists consider to be a technical recession, or two consecutive quarters of contraction.
Economists have warned of a difficult path ahead for Mexico, citing heightened domestic uncertainty, tight financial conditions and ongoing risks from the U.S. trade war.
CUTTING IMPORTS
Mexico is rolling out measures to fight against what it views as unfairly priced imports of products such as steel, textiles and furniture, Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard said.
Mexico will implement so-called reference prices, or baseline values, for imports of furniture, toys, sports equipment, paper and cardboard.
"Many times, (importers) give us a price that’s below market value," Ebrard said. "That’s why we’re rolling out reference prices, so you can’t declare a price below."
Ebrard said officials had reviewed the list of steel mills approved to import products into Mexico, and canceled the registration of around half of them.
"They were found to have inconsistencies, or irregularities, or some of them don’t even exist at all," Ebrard said.
He said the measure was meant to prevent foreign steelmakers from avoiding tariffs and to protect local producers.
The country has also punished some textile makers who were abusing a scheme meant to export clothes out of Mexico, Ebrard said. Later this month, the government will meet with textile makers and businesses which rely on the products, he added.