What to do to grow?

It is not easy to carry out what the secretary of foreign relations, Marcelo Ebrard, said is what a candidate for the presidency of Mexico needs, since the different paths to the goal of economic stability in the country are several and varied to achieve the sustainability that Mexican society needs.

A few days ago, Marcelo Ebrard put on the table the need for generating economic growth to be on the agendas to be discussed with a view to the next presidential election. Growing more is a goal that is still pending for the Mexican economy, which offers stability, but lacks dynamism. The economic engines that were activated with the commercial opening are not enough due to the lack of actions to generate greater national content, regional chaining and the integration of more regions into global commercial processes.

For a new administration that continues with what was established by the current one, but that has to go deeper into certain policies to achieve better results, it is important to return to the industrial policy agenda, which the Federal Government recently presented and which needs to be implemented. It is a very good recipe for growth. Growth has to be redirected, to be inclusive and reduce emissions, to be sustainable, but it is essential for society.

The policy has four transversal axes: innovation, human capital formation, national content and linkage, as well as sustainable industries. It proposes five strategic sectors to promote: agriculture, electronics, electromobility, pharmaceuticals and creative industries. It is not that winners are chosen, they are sectors in which Mexico obviously has the potential and conditions to grow. It considers how it can be done: facilitating investment, designing the right fiscal and financing incentives, reforming the financial system to achieve access to credit and services, seeking international financing, and ensuring that educational institutions generate the necessary skills and research.

The idea, as Mariana Mazzucato proposes for the Mexican case, is to manage manufacturers as an innovation system, in which public and private actors, universities, and research centers are involved and generate links between them.

It is proposed to take advantage of trade agreements, such as the one with North America to strengthen regional value chains. It is also possible to work on others with this approach, such as the one being negotiated with the United Kingdom, but also the one that could be consolidated with South America, where the political conditions exist for a new regional trade agreement to materialize. with a perspective that strengthens value chains and that includes Mexico.

In reality, due to the country’s transformations in recent decades, Mexico’s economy does not compete with those of Latin America, which are extractive in nature and focused on the export of raw materials and agribusiness, rather our economy is complemented by them, because of our strength in manufacturing.

The Mexican industrial strategy would be carried out in regions already integrated into global value chains, such as the border, the north and the Bajío, but also in others with great potential. For example, large metropolitan areas are ideal for the development of digital and creative industries. Industrial policy is a good idea of ​​this government, which is barely in the making, but which can be a valuable instrument to generate growth in the future.

@vidallerenas