The more than 6,500 Spanish companies employ some 350,000 Mexicans

“Mexico cannot afford to do what Argentina did with Repsol.” Iñaki Zaldua, commercial director of the Ecenarro automotive company, which has a plant in the Aztec country, thus downplays the veiled threats that its president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, launches at Spain.

Considering the importance of the 6,570 companies with Spanish capital based in Mexico, he is not without reason: they employ some 350,000 Mexicans and make our country the second that invests the most there behind the United States, some 76,000 million dollars between January and September 2021.

As if that were not enough, the balance of bilateral trade is also favorable to Mexico, which sells us more products and services than it buys from us: last November, the last month for which there are statistics, Mexican exports to Spain reached 34,515 million , 4,207 more than the value of what we send to the other side of the Atlantic.

Zaldua emphasizes that he does not feel alluded to by Obrador’s words. “We treat our workers well, which is why our turnover is very low. We neither exploit nor steal », he sentences. Of course, the director of the cooperative considers that the president’s words are “a warning to sailors addressed to the Spanish government and energy companies.”

Without a doubt, the companies in which Obrador’s words can resonate the strongest are Iberdrola, Repsol and Naturgy, affected by the energy reform that, shouting “to steal from another party”, aims to favor local companies. OHL is also its target. “The problem is in public works tenders, especially in infrastructure and energy. Obrador’s words damage the prestige that has cost us so much to create, and there are Mexican companies afraid of working with Spanish companies because of what may happen,” says Tere Fernández, president of Emprebask in the Mexican capital.

She already predicted problems as soon as AMLO reached the presidency, a man whom she calls “superb”, and she does fear that large companies such as BBVA, Banco Santander -the two largest financial entities in Mexico- or Telefónica -the second largest operator of telecommunications – may suffer from the reputational crisis.

For this reason, Fernández misses a forceful response from the Spanish and European authorities in defense of national economic interests. “Nobody says anything. Neither the Government, nor the Chambers. Obrador would not dare to deal with the United States or France », she shoots, visibly angry, stressing that some 21,000 Spaniards and 150,000 people with dual nationality reside in the country.

“There is already investment going to Colombia, and the contracts are being given to non-Spanish companies,” he adds, fearing that AMLO will use his majority to arbitrarily grant licenses and modify projects, as he did with the Mexico City airport, whose construction stopped. At the moment, Iberdrola and BBVA affirm to this newspaper that they are waiting for the situation to be clarified in order to make a pronouncement.

Basque interests

According to Spri data, there are 174 Basque companies operating in Mexico with 232 establishments, of which 113 are productive. The sectors most exposed to AMLO’s offensive belong to the 21 energy, 9 civil works and 28 engineering sectors. “It is a very important country for the Basque Country, and there are quite a few expatriates there,” says Zaldua.

Not in vain, it appears in the eleventh position in the ranking of the destination countries of Basque exports –436.6 million euros– and, as is the case in Spain as a whole, it climbs four positions in the list of imports –797 million –, which leaves as a result a trade deficit in the Basque Country of more than 200 million euros. In addition, Spri points out that “a notable decrease in exports to Mexico has been observed since 2018”, broken only by the increase registered during the first three quarters of 2021, which may be due to the crash that the pandemic produced in 2020.

Three items account for half of all that the Basque Country sells to Mexico: mechanical capital goods, iron foundry and automobiles. On the other hand, mineral fuels, which account for more than 90% of Mexico’s imports, reach the Basque lands from America.