Labor migration sneaks into the agenda of the North American Leaders Summit

There are plenty of reasons to talk about migration and employment between Mexico and the United States. Surprisingly, the issue had not been on the bilateral agenda. But reality cannot continue to contain itself, finally both nations will talk about it at the X Summit of North American Leaders.

The event, in which Canada will also participate, will take place the following week in our country. Presidents Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Joe Biden will address “bilateral cooperation issues such as migration, labor mobility,” reported Marcelo Ebrard, head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE) in December during the morning conference.

“Watch out: labor mobility has already been incorporated into the discourse, the narrative and the concepts of the relationship between Mexico and the United Statesthis did not exist, it is very recent, ”he explained.

There was the historic human mobility from Mexico. What is relatively new are the migrant caravans and the measures to stop them with the excuse of covid-19, such as Title 42. This policy was implemented by Donald Trump and prohibits the entry of those who “potentially represent a risk to health.”

By integrating the theme into the agenda bilateral“a very important recognition has been made” of the magnitude of the phenomenon, says in an interview Marath Bolaños López, Undersecretary of Employment and Labor Productivity of the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS).

“This gives us an idea of ​​the relevance it has for North America, where we have a very important integration, not only in the financial and merchandise sector, but also in the labor mobility”, adds the official.

“It has been an important challenge for the three countries that make up the region. It is forcing us to look at talent within the very borders of North America and look for ways to create mechanisms to generate greater productivity and consolidation of a regional market”.

From Mexico to the United States

In the United States, the main receiving country for migrants in the world, live more than 11.9 million people who were born in Mexico, plus another 27.6 million of second and third generation Mexican origin, according to the Yearbook of migration and remittances Mexico 2022. The document was published by the BBVA Mexico Foundation and the Ministry of the Interior (SG).

In 2021, the wage bill for Mexican immigrant workers in the United States was 283,000 million dollars, according to the Center for Latin American Monetary Studies (Cemla). This figure is equivalent to 22% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Mexico.

The millions of Mexican migrants in that country “contribute close to 60,000 million dollars in remittances, which has given an important boost to the economy,” says Marath Bolaños.

It is the first time that both nations will talk about migration and employment. But the precedent is perhaps the Treaty between Mexico, the United States and Canada (T-MEC), which incorporated a labor chapter.

Early last year, Mexican migrant day laborers requested the STPS to file a USMCA complaint against the US government for systemic discrimination and sexual violence in the H2A temporary employment program.

The temporary agricultural worker program “must also be seen as a great tool, which has operated since 1974 between Mexico and Canada. From there we can generate a care strategy for populations that are in labor mobility”, points out the undersecretary.

This type of policy “allows safe, orderly, regulated and circular transfers, because they go and return. To cite a piece of information, in the last year we had close to of 25,000 workers who, through the temporary farmworker program, moved to Canada.”

There are challenges, he acknowledges. “However, there has been significant support from the Mexican consular services in Canada to also follow up on all kinds of complaints about the Labor conditions that are not optimal.

Central America at the center of the agenda

But the matter of migration and employment It’s not just bilateral. It would be necessary to “extend this vision to neighboring countries, whose population is also in labor mobility. I am speaking mainly of Central American countries, where there have been significant displacements of people looking for work not only in the United States and Canada but also in Mexico”.

President López Obrador “has proposed to his peers in the region, throughout his term, to combat the structural causes that generate migration through sustained development in Central America, because it is also a shared phenomenon”, details the federal official.

In 2019, the program models Youth Building the Future (JCF) and Sembrando Vida were exported to Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. “In Mexico, JCF has meant a very important investment in youth, with special emphasis on areas with the highest crime incidence, social backwardness and that often generate a population in a condition of labor mobility.”

The government of President López Obrador “has proposed it as a strategy, see the social programs as an investment in society to generate better conditions and thereby reduce phenomena that we do not want to develop”, he adds.

In fiscal year 2022, the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported a record number of nearly 2.4 million encounters on the border with Mexico.

That is, they were apprehensions and expulsions of migrants mainly from Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. More than 71,000 of them were returned to our country under the program stay in mexicowhereby non-Mexican asylum seekers were forced to wait for the resolution of the US immigration courts in our territory.

In Mexico there are also more people asking for asylum. In 2022, applications broke a new record by exceeding 118,000 cases. In their wait, those people need income. “The Ministry of Labor has attended to 2,500 people on the move in the three Integration Centers for Migrants (CIM) in Tijuana, Ciudad Juárez and Matamoros”, explains Marath Bolaños. Part of that population is returned Mexican.

These centers provide accommodation, food and health, educational and employment relationship. “Through the National Employment Service (SNE) we provide them with a job profile and they are approached with vacancies.” It has also been a job “to talk to employers so that they hire these people.”

The issues within the work schedule in Mexico “they have been critical”, but it is necessary to integrate the cross-border issue, says the Undersecretary of Employment. “It will be a meeting that will help us combat the structural causes that encourage labor mobility in dangerous and unregulated conditions.”