The glory days appear to be over for Yucatán honey producers, who are facing the most difficult conditions they have seen in the last 50 years.
Between 2008 and 2012, honey production in the state reached record levels of 12,000-14,000 tonnes a year. This year, production is expected to be 4,000-7,000 tonnes at most, and the trend will most likely continue downward.
Yucatán beekeepers feel discouraged because they lack both funding and support.
“There’s worry, almost desperation,” said Nelly Ortiz Vázquez, president of the Yucatán School of Agronomic Engineers and director of the state’s Beekeepers’ Association.
“We haven’t only lost influence in international markets, but also at the national level. Yucatán fell from first to third and fourth places in honey production, surpassed by states like Jalisco and Veracruz.”
Conditions are not good for Yucatán honey producers.
According to official numbers, around 11,000 honey producers depend on beekeeping to make a living in Yucatán.
“We have no idea what could happen in 2020. Plants aren’t flowering, there’s no nectar, no support. How will we care for and conserve our bees?” she added.
She said that in the last 10 years Yucatán has faced severe deforestation that has affected all types of plants across the whole state. Bee populations have also declined because of the varroa mite.
“In Mérida, for example, although they talk about planting trees and reforestation, the urban growth and the area covered by concrete gets bigger and bigger with more residential neighborhoods. In rural areas, fires, indiscriminate felling, neglect, etc., have caused many traditional plants to die,” she said.
Market factors have also played a role in the decline of Yucatán’s honey industry.
One of its main markets is Europe, where consumers bought large quantities of the sweetener from 2005 to 2010. However, over time orders declined after China began selling a cheaper honey made from sugar beets.
“The Chinese imitate everything, even the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, and now with the beet-based honey that they are mass producing and selling cheap, they’re taking foreign markets, like those in Europe, for example,” said Ortiz. “It’s not only affecting Yucatán, but all of Mexico’s honey production.”
The cheap Chinese honey has caused the Yucatán product to fall from 50 pesos per kilo in its glory days to just 12 pesos per kilo today.
In response to the crisis, the state’s Secretariat of Rural Development announced the installation of 28 enlarged beehives with queen bees imported from Italy. The trial run aims to strengthen hives and achieve better honey production by improving the genetics of Yucatán bees.
Rural Development Secretary Jorge André Díaz Loeza stated that his department will invest 20 million pesos (US $992,000) in the project.
Ortiz hopes that the introduction of the new queen bee species will make Yucatán bees more resistant to climate change and pests like the varroa mite. She said it’s a question of culture and persistence, and that beekeepers are looking for new ways to keep their hives alive.
Sonora’s rising homicide numbers are due to a 40% deficit in police numbers, according to National Defense Secretary Luis Cresencio Sandoval.
Intentional homicides in the first seven months totaled 537, up nearly 50% over the same period last year, according to federal crime statistics.
The highest murder numbers are being seen in the capital, Hermosillo, and the municipality of Cajeme, Sandoval said. The former accounts for nearly 23% of all murders. By the end of August, there were a total of 159, 37 of those in that month alone.
Sandoval said that elements of organized crime have been detected in the state’s many police forces, and that the government will initiate a purge campaign in Hermosillo, Cajeme, Guaymas, Empalme and Navojoa to rid the forces of corruption.
“Military personnel will head [the operation], which will help with the purging process, and it begins today in Guaymas and Palme,” he said on Monday.
Currently deployed in the state are 4,323 soldiers, 568 marines, 1,186 National Guardsmen, 706 Federal Police, 1,173 state police and 3,973 municipal police. Sandoval plans to have 1,800 National Guard personnel stationed in eight coordinated regions in the state by the end of the year.
President López Obrador held his morning press conference in Sonora on Monday, during which he said the military will reinforce the work of Sonoran police forces in order to ensure public security.
“There are four municipalities where there is already an agreement that the armed forces help with public security in order to reinforce municipal police forces, such as Guaymas, Cajeme and Navojoa . . .” he said without naming the fourth.
Light on detail, self-congratulatory and lacking information that hadn’t previously been disclosed were the criticisms levelled by political pundits at President López Obrador’s first annual report.
The lack of focus on security was a shortcoming identified by Catalina Pérez Corre, one of several people consulted by the newspaper El Universal.
The law professor and researcher at the Mexico City university CIDE said she was surprised that the president only allocated a small fraction of his address to the issue.
“It’s surprising because it’s one of the issues that matters most to citizens and he didn’t provide details,” she said.
“The only thing he gave details about was the number of National Guard elements . . . He didn’t report about homicides, how many organized crime groups there are, how many [anti-crime] operations have been carried out, what they [the government] have concentrated their efforts on . . .” Pérez added.
Francisco Rivas, director of the National Citizens’ Observatory, a crime watch group, said the report was “more of the same” and accused López Obrador, and federal authorities more widely, of failing to be accountable to the Mexican people.
He was also critical of the brevity with which the president addressed the violence that is currently plaguing the country.
Rivas said that López Obrador didn’t reveal how public money has been spent to reduce insecurity and what results have been achieved in the area. The president also failed to detail the anti-crime measures it implemented but which didn’t have the “desired impact,” he said.
“. . . In the more than 90 minutes he devoted to his presentation, less than 10 were dedicated to the issue of security,” Rivas said.
Anthropologist and writer Alberto Aziz Nassif described the report as merely a summary of what has already been said at López Obrador’s daily press conferences. He also criticized the president for failing to cast a more critical eye over his government’s performance during its nine months in office.
“I expected a more detailed, thorough and critical analysis and perspective of the reality of the country,” Aziz said.
“The only critical thing that the president said is that in terms of security, there are no positive results. He didn’t say anything about [other] complicated problems such as economic stagnation . . .”
The former head of the now-defunct Federal Electoral Institute, Luis Carlos Ugalde, said there was nothing new in López Obrador’s report.
“. . . He reiterated his moralistic construction of politics, his idea that the ultimate aim of a government is [to create] happiness and that material indicators don’t matter,” he said.
Ugalde also said that it was unnecessary for the president to speak out against his political adversaries.
Meanwhile, columnist Luis Cardenas said the annual report was aimed specifically at the president’s supporters rather than the general public as it should have been.
Armed civilians cut off the hands of a 15-year-old youth in Tuxpan, Veracruz, on Saturday, evidently in punishment for theft.
Local police reported that the boy, identified only as Adrian “N,” was kidnapped, stripped naked and painted from head to toe with grey paint. The attackers used white paint to write “This happened to me because I’m a thief” on his back, torso and arms.
Then they cut off both his hands and left them in a plastic bag outside a secondary school.
The victim walked to his home where his family took him to a local hospital.
He was found to be in hypovolemic shock due to extreme blood loss, and in critical condition.
His hands had been contaminated, rendering surgical reattachment impossible although the city has neither the trained medical staff nor the facilities for such a procedure.
Local authorities have mounted a search to find those responsible.
Total remittances to Mexico hit US $41.46 billion from January to August this year. (Archive)
Remittances by Mexicans working abroad reached their second-highest monthly level in July since Mexico’s central bank (Banxico) started keeping records 24 years ago.
They sent home US $3.27 billion, 14.4% more than in July 2018. The number of transactions was 9.1% higher, while the average amount per transaction was up 5% to US $340.
Goldman Sachs analyst Alberto Ramos said he expects the growth in cash sent back to continue.
“We hope that the growth in remittances stabilizes between 4% and 6%,” he said. “The solid flow of remittances from workers has been good for the current account balance and for supporting private consumption, especially for low-income families.”
In the second quarter of 2019, Mexico achieved a current account surplus of US $5.143 billion, the largest since Banxico began keeping records in 1980. Remittances totaling US $9.403 billion were an important contributing factor for the surplus.
In his morning press conference on Monday, President López Obrador said that total remittances in 2019 could rise as high as US $35 billion, calling the money sent home by emigrants “a blessing” for the Mexican economy. However, he noted that emigration should be a choice and not an obligation.
“The support from migrants is very important, and that’s why we need to help them; they are living heroes,” he said. “What are we going to do? Despite the importance that remittances have, the most important thing is that Mexicans shouldn’t be obligated to emigrate. Those who leave the country should do it out of choice, not necessity.”
The principal source of remittances is Mexicans working in the United States.
President López Obrador with his first annual report.
President López Obrador sees progress in the transformation he has promised to bring Mexico, but cannot say the same about reducing violent crime.
The president delivered his first annual report to the nation on Sunday, asserting that the transformation “has started to become reality” but conceding that his government has not yet managed to bring down the levels of violent crime.
In an address at the National Palace, López Obrador cited austerity measures, social programs and anti-corruption actions as achievements of his administration since taking office last December.
The president blamed policies implemented by the last two federal governments, charging that the use of military and police force to combat violence was a failure and that the consequences are still being felt today.
“The results were catastrophic . . . The strategy left a horrific toll of deaths, disappearances, wounded persons and a human rights crisis . . .” López Obrador said.
He said his government will achieve peace by attending to the root causes of violence and ensuring that there are “jobs, good salaries, well-being and that young people’s right to education and work is guaranteed.”
López Obrador also highlighted that the National Guard has now been deployed to 150 regions across the country and stressed that the armed forces have committed to guaranteeing public security without violating human rights or using excessive force.
“. . . I am a man of challenges and I am perseverant and that’s why I can say that I’m sure we will be able to calm the country; Mexico will be pacified. That’s a commitment,” he said.
The president characterized his government as an inclusive one, asserting that it “represents everyone, the rich and poor, believers and freethinkers.”
He claimed that his government has established an “authentic rule of law” and that it doesn’t – “as was the custom” – intervene in the judiciary, the Attorney General’s Office or the central bank.
The president gives his report Sunday at the National Palace.
He said his administration’s austerity measures have generated savings of 145 billion pesos (US $7.2 billion) in nine months, noting that officials’ salaries and benefits have been cut, “millionaire” pensions of past presidents have been cancelled and overseas trade offices have been closed.
“The luxuries, extravagances and opulence that characterized the exercise of presidential power have reached their end,” he declared.
Continuing his attack on his predecessors, the leftist president asserted that “nothing has damaged Mexico more than the dishonesty of its rulers,” adding “that’s the main cause of economic and social inequality and the insecurity and violence we suffer.”
To narrow the inequality gap, López Obrador said that his government is now providing financial support to half of all households and nine out of 10 indigenous families. The elderly, the disabled, students and farmers are all receiving greater financial support than before, he said.
The government’s youth employment scheme and tree-planting program have provided opportunities for more than one million disadvantaged people across the country, he said, and an additional 300,000 jobs were created in the first seven months of the year. The government is “rescuing the countryside from the abandonment to which it was condemned” through financial support for farmers and guaranteed prices for five agricultural products, he said.
The president noted that the minimum salary was raised by 16% at the start of the year and that petroleum production has stabilized after 14 years of decline.
López Obrador defended his government playing a greater role in the economy than that of its predecessors.
“There is still this false idea that the state shouldn’t promote development or seek to redistribute wealth but rather limit itself to creating the conditions that allow investors to do business and assume that the benefits will automatically trickle down to the rest of society. This assumption was cruelly revealed to be false during the neoliberal period,” López Obrador said.
The president reiterated that the raison d’etre of his government is “to eradicate corruption and impunity,” citing pipeline petroleum theft as one example of a scourge permitted under previous governments that is no longer tolerated.
Fuel theft has been “practically eliminated,” López Obrador said, claiming that the crime is down 94% and savings of 50 billion pesos have been generated this year. The president also said that via decree, he put an end to the cancelation of tax debt owed by large corporations.
The president claimed credit for reaching a migration deal with the United States that avoided blanket tariffs on Mexican goods that were threatened by U.S. President Donald Trump. The agreement, López Obrador said, allowed Mexico to dodge “a possible political and economic crisis.”
More than 1,000 people marched in Mexico City to demonstrate opposition to the president’s administration.
He also highlighted cooperation with the United States to implement development projects in the Northern Triangle of Central America so that people are not forced to migrate “because of hunger or violence.”
The president claimed that the government’s airport plan for Mexico City – upgrading the airport in the capital and Toluca and building the new Santa Lucía airport – will solve the saturation problem in three years and “save more than 100 billion pesos” in comparison with what the abandoned airport project would have cost.
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec trade corridor project will create “a transport link similar to the Panama Canal,” López Obrador charged, noting also that the government is upgrading the country’s six oil refineries, building a new one on the Tabasco coast and pursuing the Maya Train project, which “will benefit the states of Quintana Roo, Yucatán, Campeche, Tabasco and Chiapas.”
However, “the most important objective of the government,” López Obrador said, is to have “in 2024 . . . a better society. . . [in which] people are living in an environment of well-being.”
“. . . For the good of all, the poor come first,” the president added.
“Only with a just society will we achieve the rebirth of Mexico. The country will not be viable if poverty and inequality persist. It’s an ethical imperative.”
As the president gave his speech, about 1,100 people marched in protest in Mexico City, chanting “Get out, López Obrador.”
One of the organizers of the march, opposition politician Fernando Belauzaran, accused the president of lying to Mexicans in his daily 7:00am press conferences.
“He doesn’t tell the truth. It’s like a festival of mythomaniac tendencies every morning,” he told journalists.
“Andrés Manuel has deceived a lot of people who believed in him. They still haven’t realized the magnitude of the mistake they made,” protester María José Tam, a 34-year-old marketing specialist, told Agence France-Presse.
About one-half of police chiefs in México state municipalities failed control and confidence tests that were administered starting in 2018, according to state Security Secretary Maribel Cervantes Guerrero.
The failure rate was somewhat lower in the ranks.
The same test was applied to 90% of the approximately 16,000 police officers in the state, and between 20% and 30% failed.
“Now that we have the results of the tests, we’re going to talk to mayors and tell them why the chiefs didn’t pass the tests,” she told the newspaper El Universal. “Most of them were contacted by people with links to organized crime with offers of collaboration. The mayors have been notified of that, and almost all of them have changed their police chiefs.”
The municipalities of Ecatepec, Chalco and Naucalpan were among those where their mayors replaced the chiefs after they failed the exam.
As if to corroborate the results of testing, six municipal police officers in Ecatepec, the most populous municipality in the state, were arrested last Thursday by state police for their involvement in the kidnapping of a businessman.
Of Ecatepec’s 2,300 police officers, 380 are being investigated for various infractions, including losing their weapons, lack of discipline, corruption and abuse of authority.
In the municipality of Tlalnepantla, three municipal police officers were arrested recently for setting up illegal roadblocks to kidnap motorists. Police Chief César Dorantes Rodríguez admitted that as many as 690 Tlalnepantla officers are under investigation, although not all of them for corruption.
There’s a different story in the municipality of Nezahualcóyotl. Police Chief Jorge Amador Amor, who began his job in 2003 with only a civilian background, uses community policing strategies and only two or three officers have been accused of abuse of authority or extortion.
'El Abuelo' Farías, target of the Jalisco cartel's Tepacaltepec invasion.
Murders attributed to organized crime broke a record in August at 2,290, a 77.8% increase over the same month last year.
It was the third month in a row with over 2,000 such murders — there were 2,264 in July and 2,249 in June.
With 240 murder cases, Guanajuato topped the list of the most violent states, followed by México state with 206, Baja California 196, Veracruz 176, Jalisco 167 and Michoacán 128.
The month’s most striking case, however, is that of Veracruz, which saw one of the year’s worst massacres when an attack on a nightclub in Coatzacoalcos left 30 dead and 13 injured.
The attack bumped the murder rate in the state by 35.3% over the previous month.
Although Michoacán saw just one more murder than in July and did not surpass its June total of 140 cases, it also stood out in August for two grave instances of violence linked to narco-trafficking.
Guanajuato is the battleground between the CJNG and the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel. The bitter rivalry sent the state’s homicide rate up to 240 cases, shattering July’s total of 185.
Despite the historic levels of violence, federal Public Security Secretary Alfonso Durazo told a press conference on Friday that Mexico is getting closer to achieving peace, while admitting that the government’s anti-crime strategy has not yet delivered.
A state police officer mans a checkpoint in Tepacaltepec, Michoacán.
At least 12 people were killed in Michoacán in four different attacks on Sunday.
In the first incident, the bodies of five men were found in the Presa de los Reyes neighborhood of Morelia, where two women were wounded in the same incident, according to Michoacán prosecutors.
That was followed by the killing of four men by armed civilians in Lázaro Cárdenas.
Later in the day, two more men were killed in the municipalities of Tepalcatepec and Coeneo, while last night a group of state police officers were attacked in Sahuayo. One officer was killed and five others were wounded.
Michoacán is one of the states where homicides numbers have increased since 2018, when they were at a record high. The most violent municipalities in the state are Morelia, Uruapan, Zamora, Sahuayo, La Huacana and Los Reyes.
According to police, much of the violence in Michoacán is related to the conflict between the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and the Los Viagras gang for territorial control.
One of the recent flashpoints for that conflict has been the municipality of Tepalcatepec, which borders the state of Jalisco. On Friday, nine people were killed when members of the CJNG began a campaign to try to take control of the municipality from the Los Viagras.
Michoacán Public Security Secretary Israel Patrón Reyes told the newspaper Milenio that the nine people who died were members of the CJNG who had traveled from Jalisco to carry out the attack.
'This property is in the process of being seized,' reads a sign posted by La Paz authorities.
The mayor of La Paz, Baja California Sur, says the municipal government will seize properties whose owners have failed to pay their taxes.
Rubén Muñoz told the newspaper BCS Noticias that there are unpaid taxes on 400 properties, including 76 vacant lots, whose owners owe over 12 million pesos (US $597,830).
The municipality started acting against the delinquent properties on August 16, but Muñoz said that only 76 property owners have been notified so far.
“It’s mostly property tax debts going back more than five years,” he said. “There are also environmental violations on many of the properties.”
Muñoz noted that the owners of the properties in question have violated their obligation as citizens to pay property taxes.
“Citizens have rights, but also have obligations, and one of the most important ones, for people who live in cities, is paying property taxes,” he said.
La Paz is not the only municipality where property owners neglect to pay their taxes. In Acapulco, 40% of the 267,000 property taxpayers were in default, the municipality said in May.
