Investments worth nearly US $26B announced for Mexico so far this year

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March 1, 2024

A man wearing a facemask unloads packages of plastic Coca Cola bottles from a truck — Arca Continental handles Coca Cola bottling operations in 14 of Mexico's 32 states. (Mario Jasso/Cuartoscuro.com)

Mexico can expect to receive almost US $26 billion in new investment in the next two to three years based on investment announcements made by foreign and Mexican companies in the first two months of 2024.

The Economy Ministry (SE) said in a new report that companies made 52 investment announcements totaling $25.84 billion between Jan. 1 and Feb. 29.

“It’s expected that said amount will enter the country in the next two or three years,” the SE said, although at least some of the money will presumably come from Mexico given that almost 40% of the total was announced by FEMSA, a Mexico-based multinational that is a Coca-Cola bottler and convenience store owner.

The SE said that the 52 investment announcements made in January and February are expected to generate 28,702 jobs. On the X social media platform, the ministry said that the announcements reaffirm that there is no better time than now to invest in Mexico “thanks to the economic policy of the Mexican government, which promotes the relocation … of strategic industries.”

The 10 largest investment announcements

FEMSA announced in February that it would invest around 170 billion pesos in Mexico over the next five years. That amount is listed as US $ 9.96 billion in the SE report.

A very typical Oxxo store of today, with its blaring red and yellow facade. — FEMSA is a Coca Cola bottler and the parent company of Oxxo convenience stores. (Wikimedia Commons)

FEMSA, which owns the Oxxo chain of convenience stores and has 17 Coca-Cola bottling plants in Mexico among other assets, said the money would go to “organic growth initiatives in our key businesses.”

The SE listed the company’s “country of origin” as both Mexico and the United States, presumably due to its association with the Atlanta-based Coca-Cola Company.

Ranking second to fifth for the size of their investment announcements in the first two months of the year are:

Amazon Web Services (United States), which plans to invest some $5 billion in a cluster of data centers in Querétaro. (The SE said the amount announced was $4.96 billion).
DHL Supply Chain (Germany), which plans to invest an additional $4 billion in Mexico.
Ternium (Argentina), which intends to invest $1.94 billion in its steelworks.
Volkswagen (Germany), which will spend around $1 billion to upgrade its plant in Puebla. (The SE listed the investment announcement at $942 million).

Having made investment announcements of between $270 million and $601 million, the other companies in the top 10 are: Solarever (China); ELAM-FAW (China); Nemak (Netherlands); Unison Shanghai (China); and Aspen Aerogels (United States).

Where will the money come from and where will it go?

The SE said that $15.83 billion, or more than 60% of the total announced in January and February, will come from the United States. That amount includes FEMSA’s investment.

A chart showing the percent each of Mexico's top investor countries plans to invest in coming years — The U.S. is the top source of investments, due in part to the Economy Ministry’s decision to count the Mexico-based multinational as a U.S. company (FEMSA operates in the U.S. and Latin America). (Secretaría de Economía/X)

The United States was the top foreign investor in Mexico last year, with $13.64 billion flowing into the country from the U.S., according to SE data.

The next biggest investors by country based on announcements made in the first two months of the year were:

Germany: $5.23 billion or just over 20% of the total.
Argentina: $1.94 billion or 7.5% of the total.
China: $1.58 billion or 6.1% of the total.
Netherlands: $404.6 million or 1.6% of the total.

The biggest recipients of the investment are set to be Querétaro (mainly due to Amazon’s data center project); México state; Nuevo León; Puebla; and Durango.

The SE said that 62% of the money, or just over $16 billion, will go to the manufacturing sector, while just over 19%, or almost $5 billion, is headed for the “mass media” industry, which includes data centers. Just over $4.4 billion, or 17% of the total, will go to the transport sector, the ministry said.

The SE provides semi-regular updates on private companies’ investment announcements for Mexico. It previously reported that there were 363 announcements totaling over $106 billion between January and November 2023. That figure is almost triple the actual foreign direct investment (FDI) received in 2023, which was just over $36 billion.

A chart and map showing how much investment went to different Mexican states — Querétaro took the lion’s share the announced investments, thanks to the Amazon Data Center planned for that state. (Secretaría de Economía/X)

FDI in Mexico is expected to increase in coming years.

That expectation takes into account the investment announcements already made as well as the belief that more and more foreign companies will choose to nearshore to Mexico to take advantage of proximity to the United States as well as things such as the country’s free trade agreement with that country and Canada (the USMCA) and affordable labor costs.

Mexico News Daily

Got 1 min? New tropical fish species discovered in Mexico’s Pacific waters

By

MND Staff

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March 1, 2024

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30819573250_0b64c9d726_b — The new species was discovered near Mexico’s Revillagigedo Archipelago, a group of islands southwest of Baja California Sur. (Presidencia de la Republica Mexicana/Flickr)

A new species of tropical fish was discovered within Mexico’s Revillagigedo Archipelago, located over 400 kilometers southwest of the state of Baja California Sur.

Scientists from UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography believe the fish, dubbed a tailspot wrasse, is endemic to the waters around the four islands that comprise the archipelago.

The Halichoeres sanchezi, or tailspot wrasse, is named after the marine scientist who first collected the species, Carlos Armando Sánchez Ortiz. (PeerJ)

The eight specimens collected range in size from one inch to nearly six inches. The females, smaller than the males, appear white with reddish horizontal stripes on top with dispersed black patches. The males are orangey red on top with a yellow belly and a dark band near the tail.

The fish has been named Halichoeres sanchezi in honor of marine scientist Carlos Armando Sánchez Ortiz of the Autonomous University of Baja California Sur, who collected the first specimen in an underwater field of volcanic rubble and lava boulders.

According to an abstract published Wednesday in the academic journal Peer J, the discovery was made during the last day of a November 2022 expedition to inventory the archipelago’s ichthyofauna, defined as the fish life in a specific body of water or zoogeographic region.

The researchers relied on underwater photographers to systematically document specimens in situ, before hand-collecting the fish.

During the two-week expedition, the group made 30 research dives that produced 5,500 photographs and collected roughly 900 specimens representing more than 100 fish species.

Ben Frable, a member of the expedition and co-author of the paper, believes two more previously unknown species could be identified from specimens collected on the trip.

Granted in 1861 to the Pacific Coast of Colima to establish a penal colony, the Revillagigedo Archipelago is part of a submerged mountain range, its four islands the peaks of underwater volcanoes.

The waters of the archipelago, popular with scuba divers, have an abundance of large pelagic species, such as manta rays, whales, dolphins and sharks, as well as sea turtles.

In June 2016, the archipelago was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site, while in 2017 it was declared a national park and a marine reserve, the largest such protected area in North America. The marine reserve covers 150,000 square kilometers (57,000 square miles), and is protected from fishing, mining and tourism development.

With reports from Axios San Diego and UC San Diego Today

Mexico in Numbers: Illegal weapons trafficking

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Mexico Institute/Wilson Center

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March 1, 2024

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Destrucción armas Culiacán-5.jpg — Guns reach Mexico by means of "ant-trafficking," a cross-border firearm trafficking phenomenon that involves discreet movement of small quantities. (Rashide Frias/Cuartoscuro)

The United States and Mexico have grappled with increasing arms and drug trafficking for several years.

In response to recent surges in violence, Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office (FGR) and the United States Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) undertook a joint effort to trace the origin and number of firearms in Mexico coming from or through the United States.

Sourced firearms trafficked from the United States to Mexico 2016-2022. (Mexico Institute)

The data in this article highlights the growth in the bilateral arms trade, with particular emphasis on the years 2016-2022.

Mexico’s Foreign Affairs Ministry found that 70-90% of traced firearms originated from and passed through the United States. The ATF and the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimated a lower rate of 68%, comprising 50% domestically produced and 18% imported into the U.S., and ultimately found in Mexico.

The ATF data unveils compelling insights. Although pistols consistently topped the list of firearms found by the ATF, there was a 105% increase in rifles found in Mexico and reported from 2016 to 2022, meaning that cartels may be favoring this type of firearm.

Specific U.S. counties have been linked to weapons found across Mexican municipalities, spanning from the Pacific to the Atlantic coasts, as highlighted by former Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard and the FGR.

Sourced firearms trends 2016-22. (Mexico Institute)

Concurrently, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has identified the presence of “ant-trafficking,” the intentional diversion of firearms from legal channels, and straw purchases, where individuals buy guns on behalf of others, along these routes.

These actions intensify the illegal transportation of firearms. The presence of guns in Mexico, as well as these two phenomena, demonstrate the connection of these trafficking routes, amplifying illegal firearm transportation.

The increase in these practices necessitates enhanced collaborative efforts between the United States and Mexico to curb the unlawful flow of firearms.

“Ant-trafficking” is identified by UNODC as a cross-border firearm trafficking phenomenon that involves discreet movement of small quantities, often targeting localized demands.

Increase in sourced firearms travelling through U.S. into Mexico 2016-2022. (Mexico Institute)

It is characterized by smaller batches and single straw purchases — a method where the intended buyer, either incapable of passing the mandatory federal background check or seeking to distance themselves from the transaction, employs another person who can successfully navigate the background check to acquire the firearm on their behalf.

Law enforcement data indicates that the majority of cross-border seizures involve fewer than five firearms, supporting the “ant-trafficking” pattern (UNODC, 2020; ATF, 2021).

Moreover, the U.S. grapples with the persistent issue of firearms trafficking across both its northern and southern borders. Illegal purchase of firearms within the U.S., often orchestrated by straw purchasing cells at the direction of cartels, fuels trafficking into Mexico (ATF, 2021).

U.S. counties contributing the most to firearms traced in Mexico 2020-2022. (Mexico Institute)

These infographics feature data sourced from the ATF, verified by the GAO. Additional information is derived from the White House, Mexico’s Office of the Attorney General (FGR), and UNODC on cross-border firearm trafficking between 2016 and 2022.

Mexican municipalities with most firearms traced to the U.S. 2020-2022. (Mexico Institute)

This article was originally published by The Mexico Institute at The Wilson Center.

Guillermo Lemus graduated in 2023 with a Bachelor of Arts in International Studies from BYU-Idaho, with an emphasis in Public Policy and Administration, before pursuing an Internship in D.C. with Congressman Correa’s Office. Previously, he was a staff assistant intern in the Mexico Institute.

Expo Plaza Hotel in Guadalajara partially collapses; none injured

By

MND Staff

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March 1, 2024

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GHiNhrba4AA2P7S — A pickup truck parked in the area ended up in the rubble. (@PCJalisco/X)

A suburban Guadalajara hotel property once owned by a man considered to be Mexico’s first cocaine kingpin suffered a structural collapse on Thursday.

Fortunately, there were no injuries when the roof of the Expo Plaza Hotel’s parking lot entrance came crashing down. Only a pickup truck parked in the area was caught in the rubble.

Wear and tear caused the roof of the Expo Plaza Hotel’s parking lot entrance to collapse on Thursday. (booking.com)

Firefighters with Jalisco’s civil protection unit reviewed the collapse and made an initial determination that the causes were wear and tear, weight overload and humidity.

The hotel is located in Zapopan, Jalisco, a city of approximately 1.25 million people in the Guadalajara metropolitan area.

It previously operated as the Motor Hotel Américas, owned by Guadalajara Cartel founder Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, reportedly from 1980 until his arrest in 1989. The native of Culiacán, Sinaloa, known as “The Godfather” and “El Jefe de Jefes” (The Boss of Bosses), is now 77 and reportedly suffering from various health problems as he serves out a 40-year prison sentence.

His cartel controlled much of the drug traffic moving through Mexico in the 1980s, and he was convicted for involvement in the 1985 murder of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena Salazar.

His portrayal in the Netflix series “Narcos: Mexico” included how he used hotels to front his illicit activities. The Motor Hotel Américas was his first property, and according to the newspaper El Financiero, “There are indications that the place was the scene of Guadalajara Cartel operations, such as murders and other violent events.”

The new iteration of the hotel opened in 2011, in the Paseos del Sol neighborhood of Zapopan, right across the street from the Plaza del Sol shopping center where Guadalajara’s first Pizza Hut opened in 1969.

After the collapse of the roof, the hotel suspended its normal activities, guests were evacuated and the perimeter was secured as a preventive measure.

With reports from El Financiero and Proceso

Report says aquifer that supplies Mexico City will run out of water in 40 years

By

MND Staff

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March 1, 2024

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Water tanks being filled on a rooftop — It will cost approximately 97 billion pesos (US $5.7 billion) to avert the crisis, according to a report by UNAM. (Rogelio Morales Ponce/Cuartoscuro)

Experts from Mexico’s UNAM Water Network and other water-security agencies have warned that the aquifer sustaining the Valley of México, the primary water source for over 23.6 million residents in Mexico City and its surrounds, will be depleted within 40 years.

The dire prognosis came with an urgent call for immediate action and a substantial investment of 97 billion pesos (US $5.7 billion) over the next 15 years to avert a water crisis of unprecedented proportions.

The current extraction of water from the aquifer exceeds natural recharge rates by 2.5 times. (Crisanta Espinosa Aguilar/Cuartoscuro)

Presented this week, the report “Water Perspectives in the Valley of Mexico: Guidelines Towards Water Security” underscored the criticality of addressing the impending exhaustion of the Mexico City aquifer, which is part of a system of aquifers.

Its release came on the heels of another recent report, from the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness (IMCO), that said “severe, extreme and exceptional droughts” were affecting more than 1,600 municipalities around the nation.

“Specific actions are required for the next 15 years, for which 97 billion pesos are required to reverse the symptoms of water insecurity in the Valley of México,” said Marisa Mazari Hiriart, coordinator of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) Seminar on Society, Environment, and Institutions.

She said there needs to be a “transformation towards sustainable water management. If this does not happen, the train is going to take us all together.”

A dry reservoir in Mexico — Failure to provide reliable access to water is likely to dissuade further foreign investment in Mexico, says Wilson Center researcher Alexandra Helfgott. (Crisanta Espinosa Aguilar/Cuartoscuro)

Fernando González Villarreal, technical coordinator of the UNAM Water Network, also emphasized the need for a paradigm shift in water management.

The first general director of the National Water Commission (Conagua), González Villarreal said the current extraction of water exceeds natural recharge rates by 2.5 times.

“Our aquifer, the treasure that we have in the subsoil of this valley, we have enormous storage that, according to our calculations, we have for 40 years if we continue at the rate of overexploitation that we have today; then we would exhaust it in 40 years. But this aquifer has stored water for 30,000 years.”

Adding to the problem is that an aquifer with a low water table can more easily experience erosion, surface fractures and the downward flow of pollution into the aquifer.

Swathes of Mexico City were left without running water in January, and neighborhood restrictions are in place due to low reserves. (Rogelio Morales/Cuartoscuro)

González Villarreal called for a new governance scheme for basin management, and said that without adequate financing and a revamped management strategy, achieving water security in the Valley of Mexico is an insurmountable challenge.

The proposed 15-year investment aligns with a comprehensive plan outlined in the Agreement for Water Security in the Valley of México. The plan was crafted by experts from the UNAM Water Network, the Regional Center for Water Security (under UNESCO’s auspices), Agua Capital and the Mexico City Water Fund. The plan comprises 14 proposals aimed at ensuring water security by 2040.

Additionally, the experts proposed diversifying water sources by doing feasibility studies on other aquifers, such as the Mezquital Valley Aquifer.

However, a recent plan floated by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to provide the capital’s residents with water from the Mezquital Valley aquifer, which is partially closed, was not met with open arms by locals.

With reports from Milenio and El Economista

Mexico’s presidential candidates are off to the races as campaign season officially kicks off

By

MND Staff

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March 1, 2024

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A collage showing Mexican presidential candidates Claudia Sheinbaum, Jorge Álvarez Maynez and Xóchitl Gálvez — Presidential candidates Xóchitl Gálvez, Claudia Sheinbaum and Jorge Álvarez Maynez kicked off their campaigns on Friday, the first official day of the 2024 federal campaign season. (X)

The official campaign period for Mexico’s upcoming federal election began Friday, exactly 93 days before voters will go to the polls to elect a new president for the next six years.

Just three candidates are in the running to become Mexico’s next president, and that person — in all likelihood — will be a woman for the first time ever.

Xóchitl Gálvez, presidential candidate for the three-party Strength and Heart for Mexico opposition alliance, got her campaign off to a flying start, holding a launch event in Zacatecas that began at the stroke of midnight.

Claudia Sheinbaum, candidate for the ruling Morena party and the clear favorite to win the June 2 election, will launch her campaign with a rally in Mexico City’s central square, the Zócalo, on Friday afternoon, while the third candidate, Jorge Álvarez Maynez of the minor Citizens’ Movement party, will begin his campaign in a notoriously violent municipality in Jalisco.

Violence and insecurity are set to be central themes in the three-month-long presidential campaign, as Mexico’s murder rate remains alarmingly high, even as homicides declined on a year-over-year basis in 2023.

The economy, poverty and inequality, the tax system, the judicial system, migration, health care, education, the relationship with the United States, nearshoring and the legacy of President López Obrador are among the other issues set to feature in the three-way contest.

Xóchitl Gálvez stands in front of a crowd in front of a large plaza as confetti rains down — Xóchitl Gálvez holds a dove at her midnight campaign kickoff in Zacatecas. (Xóchitl Gálvez/X)

In addition to voting for a new president, citizens will renew both houses of federal Congress on June 2, electing 500 deputies and 128 senators. Thousands of municipal and state positions including eight governorships and the mayorship of Mexico City will also be up for grabs in Mexico’s largest-ever elections on the first Sunday in June.

The official campaign periods for most of the municipal and state elections will begin later in March or in April, although those for the mayoral race in Mexico City and the gubernatorial contest in Yucatán also began Friday.

Xóchitl Gálvez’s coalition: National Action Party (PAN), Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and Democratic Revolution Party (PRD)

The 61-year-old Hidalgo native has made it clear that she wants to make this election — at least in part — a referendum on who has the best plan to combat Mexico’s high levels of violence and insecurity.

Launching her campaign in the notoriously violent city of Fresnillo, the former PAN senator presented her security strategy and declared that “a Mexico without fear is possible, and we’re going to achieve it.”

Gálvez, if elected, plans to continue using the military for public security tasks, but says she will relieve them of other duties such as building infrastructure, fixing roads and running hotels.

She also intends to increase the size of the National Guard — a security force created by the current government — and develop its capacity to investigate crimes and arrest criminals.

National Guard soldiers march in a line — The National Guard, which replaced the federal police in 2019, is the responsibility of the Security Ministry but operates under army leadership on the ground. (File photo)

“Hugs for criminals are over, the law will be applied for them,” Gálvez said early Friday, referencing López Obrador’s non-confrontational security strategy known colloquially as “hugs, not bullets.”

“… To have a Mexico without fear, we’re going to contain the most violent and aggressive criminal organizations in our country,” she said.

“We will especially go after those organizations that extort and threaten citizens as well as those that attack people on highways,” Gálvez said.

Among the other aspects of her security strategy are plans to increase funding for states to improve their crime-fighting capacity and to pay police higher salaries.

The coalition she represents includes parties both on the right (PAN) and left (PRD) of the political spectrum. The three parties first joined forces before the 2021 midterm elections, after the candidates they backed in the 2018 presidential election were comprehensively beaten by López Obrador.

Claudia Sheinbaum’s coalition: National Regeneration Movement (Morena), Labor Party (PT), Ecological Green Party of Mexico (PVEM)

Poll results show that Sheinbaum has a double-digit advantage over Gálvez, making her the heavy favorite to win on June 2 and thus become Mexico’s first ever female president.

The main reason for her popularity is undisputed — she represents a continuation of the political project initiated by her former boss and mentor, López Obrador, best known as AMLO, who has maintained high approval ratings throughout his presidency even as violence remained a major problem and the country endured a difficult COVID-19 pandemic.

Sheinbaum — a 61-year-old Mexico City native who was mayor of the capital between 2018 and 2023 and served as environment minister when López Obrador was mayor in the early 2000s — is steadfastly committed to building what she calls the segundo piso, or second story, of AMLO’s political project, known as the “fourth transformation,” or 4T.

Claudia Sheinbaum poses with her election team. (Claudia Sheinbaum/X)

She is also committed to continuing to invest heavily in the welfare and social programs created or strengthened by the current government — programs that are highly popular among tens of millions of low-income Mexicans who make up a large part of López Obrador’s political base.

Sheinbaum has also expressed her support for the package of constitutional reform proposals AMLO sent to Congress last month, among which are ones aimed at guaranteeing that annual minimum salary increases outpace inflation; overhauling the pension system so that retired workers receive pensions equivalent to 100% of their final salaries; and allowing citizens to directly elect Supreme Court justices and other judges.

The Morena candidate on Thursday announced some new additions to her campaign team, including former foreign affairs minister Marcelo Ebrard, who had remained distant from Shienbaum after finishing second in the contest to secure the ruling party’s nomination.

Sheinbaum’s team also includes ex-interior minister Adán Augusto López and former economy minister Tatiana Clouthier. The coalition she represents — dominated by the leftist Morena party — is called Sigamos Haciendo Historia, or Let’s Keep Making History.

Jorge Álvarez Maynez: Citizens Movement (MC)

Álvarez is the most recent entrant to the 2024 presidential contest, entering the fray in January after Nuevo León Governor Samuel García — the original MC candidate — pulled out of the race amid political turmoil in his home state.

At 38, the former federal lawmaker is much younger than Gálvez and Sheinbaum, and he is clearly courting the votes of younger Mexicans, who make up a significant part of the electorate.

Álvarez, who had just 5% support among respondents to one recent poll, launches his campaign in Lagos de Moreno, a municipality in Jalisco that is plagued by violent crime.

Despite his low poll numbers, he remains outwardly confident that he can be competitive in the June 2 election.

“Campaigns are won in the field and they last 90 days — and even the last minute has 60 seconds. This isn’t over until it’s over,” Álvarez says in a new political ad.

With reports from Expansíon Política

The pre-Columbian board game of gambling, glyphs and poison beans

By

John Pint

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March 1, 2024

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4 sm-Archaeologist-Joseph-Mountjoy-in-Mascota-abb-patolli — Joseph Mountjoy has spent years documenting the petroglyphs of Jalisco, and is an expert on the history of the strange board game of Patolli. (Joseph Mountjoy)

While hiking along the Angostura Interpretive Trail — located seven kilometers north of Lake Chapala — I came upon a flat rock about the size and height of a low table.

Incised upon it was a simple design: a circle divided into four parts by a cross, with a small circle in each section. Outside the design, as if by way of signature, there was a simple sketch of a jaguar’s head.

Patolli petroglyphs carved into a rock near Lake Chapala. (John Pint)

I had never seen a petroglyph quite like this. Getting home, I sent a photo of the rock to archaeologist Joseph Mountjoy, who has spent much of his life discovering, cataloging, and interpreting petroglyphs in western Mexico. “It could be an abbreviated patolli,” replied Dr. Mountjoy. And with this message, I was launched into the intriguing story of the pre-Columbian patolli.

Playing with poisonous beans

The word patolli, Mountjoy explained to me, is Nahuatl for an ancient form of what we call board games, in which markers are moved along a track, which might be scratched in the ground or painted on a portable mat — and only rarely carved into the surface of a flat rock.

The number of spaces the markers move depends on the throw of objects that served the same purpose as dice. In many cases, they were dark-red beans — also called “patolli” — with a white hole on one side. These were probably poisonous mescal beans (Sophora secundiflora).

Just as in modern board games, a throw of the beans might land a player’s token on a square where they lose their turn, get an extra turn, or — if they are unlucky — get sent back to the starting space.

The beans used to play patolli may well have been poisonous mescal beans, and were used in a similar manner to dice. (Carlos Velazco)

Gambling and drinking

Perhaps the earliest account of how the game was played was written by Spanish historian Fray Diego Durán. It may have been transcribed from a native manuscript written shortly after the Spanish conquest:

“On this mat was painted a large X, which reached from corner to corner to corner. Within the arms of the X certain lines were marked or striped with liquid rubber… Twelve pebbles were used in these squares: six red and six blue. These pebbles were divided among those who played, each given his share.”

“If two played, which was the usual form, each took six pebbles and when many played, one played for all, [the others] abiding by his luck, just as the Spaniards play games of chance betting on whom [they hope to be] the winner. The same was done here. [Bets were made] on the one who best handled the dice. These were black beans, five or six, depending upon how one wanted to play. On each bean was a small space painted with the number of the squares which it could advance at each play.”

Patolli, Mountjoy told me, was played by both the rich and the poor, and the playing of the game was apparently a very lively event, filled with excitement.

Pre-Hispanic art portrays games of Patolli as significant events, watched over by kings. (INAH)

“The only ethnographic evidence that we have about what went on,” said Mountjoy, “is in respect to the Aztecs. There would tend to be two players playing on the board. Each one had his team and the team would be betting. Based on what we know about Mesoamerican betting, they could bet anything and everything: precious stones, land, women, children, clothes. And they drank pulque while they played. So it sounds a bit like Las Vegas, where you might see people at the roulette wheel with their friends behind them, rooting them on and drinking their cocktails. This was the poker of those times.”

This image is consistent with the findings of American ethnographer Stewart Culin who published “Games of the North American Indians” in 1907. “Culin’s work,” said Mountjoy, “indicates that Indigenous people truly liked to play games, lots and lots of them.”

11,000 petroglyphs but only one patolli

Joseph Mountjoy had no knowledge of patollis until he and his team found one incised on a horizontal rock in Jalisco’s Tomatlán Valley in 1977.

“When I saw it, I said ‘This is a strange-looking thing,’” he told me. “It was all the more remarkable because we had already found 11,000 petroglyphs in the Tomatlán Valley… but only one patolli! So I started digging into the subject of patollis. I learned, for example, that in the 1940s an anthropologist had described Tarascans playing patolli on a board. It turned out you could take the rules that the Tarascans were following and use them to play the game on the patolli design we found in Tomatlán. This was impressive.”

One of the Tomatlán Patolli boards. (Joseph Mountjoy)

While researching the Tomatlán area, adds Mountjoy, “we also found several odd ceramic pieces. One is shaped exactly like a Hershey’s Kiss and the other is a pottery disk somewhat resembling modern checkers, with a gouged pit on one side and a cross incised on the opposite face. It seems possible that they were using one of these as the marker and the other as the die. The latter resembles the bone dice used by numerous native American groups.”

“For a long time,” Mountjoy told me, “the literature suggested that Indians from India had contacted the American civilizations and had introduced the game of Parcheesi to them, which became known as patolli. But they were just a little bit off. Recent research into this topic has proven that it was the patolli game of Mesoamerica that went to India, and not vice versa. The game doesn’t appear in India until the 1500s or 1600s.”

Patolli today

“Are people in Mexico still playing these games somewhere?” I asked Dr. Mountjoy.

“I was in Mazatlán not long ago,” he replied, “for a conference on patollis, and while I was there discussing this, somebody told me that people were still playing a version of the patolli up in the mountains east of Mazatlán. They may have been incising the design on the ground, and they were using bottle caps on the boards.”

If you’d like to try your hand at the Mesoamerican game of patolli, there’s no need to travel all the way to Mazatlán. Thanks to the kind folks at the Otago Museum in New Zealand, of all places, you can download and print out your own patolli board, complete with directions on how to play (though without any pulque). I just hope these New Zealanders’ next project will give me directions for playing on the abbreviated patolli I found near Lake Chapala.

The writer has lived near Guadalajara, Jalisco, for more than 30 years and is the author of A Guide to West Mexico’s Guachimontones and Surrounding Area and co-author of Outdoors in Western Mexico. More of his writing can be found on his website.

5 die battling forest fire in central Oaxaca

By

MND Staff

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March 1, 2024

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GHi6WGvWMAAEySG — Five people have died fighting a forest fire in the state of Oaxaca. (Salomón Cruz/X)

Five residents of the town of San Lucas Quiaviní died while fighting a forest fire that threatened their village in the eastern section of the Central Valleys region of the state of Oaxaca, some 40 kilometers from state capital Oaxaca City.

Villagers tried to contain the conflagration that started on Tuesday, but the fire quickly spread and five men were overwhelmed by the advancing fire on Wednesday.

Six fires remains active in the region. (Salomón Cruz/X)

State authorities were alerted as soon as the fire was spotted, but villagers say officials were slow to react.

The Oaxaca state government did not issue an emergency assistance plan until after the fatalities were reported, two days after being alerted to the fire. By then, San Lucas Quiaviní had issued a call to neighboring municipalities to help combat the blaze.

Upon announcing the plan, Governor Salomón Cruz Jara expressed regret in a post on social media platform X: “We mourn the terrible deaths of five residents of San Lucas Quiaviní in a fire that threatened their community. Designated officials are continuing to work to control this fire. I send my deepest condolences to the families affected and reiterate our support and solidarity.”

The National Forestry Commission on Thursday conducted a flyover to determine the magnitude of the fire and direct firefighting efforts in conjunction with the state Forestry Commission and civil protection personnel from the municipalities of Tlacolula de Matamoros, where San Lucas Quiaviní is located, and San Pablo Villa de Mitla.

Fire brigades from the nearby communities of San Isidro Huayápam and El Tequio Xoxocotlán are working alongside National Forestry Commission personnel.

Municipal and community officials have been tasked with safeguarding the volunteers helping to control the fire. In all, roughly 200 volunteers and official personnel were on site. The Oaxaca Attorney General’s Office sent a forensic team to recover the bodies and help investigate the origins of the fire.

There are currently six active forest fires in Oaxaca, including a second in the Central Valleys region, far to the southwest near the village of La Compañía.

With reports from Proceso and El Universal

My midlife awakening: Why I moved my family to Mexico

By

Debbie Slobe

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March 1, 2024

11

085beb0b-6f9f-4913-bb8f-d576779e04a5 — The Slobe family tore up the traditional playbook by moving to Mexico. Here they are at one of their favorite Mexican mountain town getaways, Tapalpa, Jalisco. (Debbie Slobe)

Some people reach their 40s and 50s and go through what is known as a midlife crisis. This is the time of life when, if you’ve bought into the illusory American Dream, you should have reached the pinnacle of your career, raised the prescribed 2.5 children, obtained a house in the suburbs and finally gotten your act together.

In reality, this is rarely the case. As the wealth divide in the United States grows into an absolute chasm, compounded by decades of systemic racism and discrimination for many Americans, it’s become next to impossible for working and middle-class families to realize this “dream.” Even for high-income households, “having it all” doesn’t always live up to expectations. And when expectations – no matter how real or delusional – aren’t met, people can be driven to make some pretty drastic changes to their lives. No doubt you’ve heard the old midlife crisis cliché about the 50-something-year-old man buying a sports car and chasing a younger woman, or the woman who ran off with her tennis coach/pool boy. Maybe you know people who have done just that.

Suburbia might be the American dream, but it’s not for everyone. (Jimmy Conover/Unsplash)

My husband and I come from fairly privileged backgrounds compared to a lot of Americans. We are both college-educated, able-bodied and white with solid family and social support. We launched our lives together and careers in the late 90s when the economy was booming.

We never made a ton of money – my husband was a public school teacher and I worked for non-profits – but we lived within our means and prioritized our spending on what mattered most to us: experiences over stuff; adventuring over settling down.

It took us 10 years to get married and another 10 to have a child. We spent big chunks of our 20s and 30s living and working in other countries. We envisioned a life together that allowed us to see the world and still pay the bills. We wanted a home base, but not one that would tie us down.

But by the time we hit our 40s, we found ourselves living the stereotypical American Dream. We had stable jobs, a house in the suburbs, a dog and by some miracle of biology, a healthy baby girl (that’s a whole other story). While we loved our lot and the community we had settled into, there was a part of us that we didn’t recognize anymore.

The Slobe family – Brian, Maya, and Debbie – when they first received their Mexican residency cards in 2015. (Debbie Slobe)

Plus, the stress of achieving all that had started to take its toll. My husband was struggling to be both the best middle school teacher and new father he could be. I was being pulled into more responsibilities at work soon after I had become a new mom. Our daughter was what you would politely call a “highly-spirited” toddler. We felt overwhelmed, like time was flying by, and that if we didn’t make a change we’d wake up in another 10 years in the same place doing the same thing and our daughter would be nearly grown up. This wasn’t the life we had envisioned for ourselves. This was our midlife crisis.

But unlike the cliché, we didn’t let our crisis drive us apart. We knew what we had to do, and we had to do it together. It was time to tap back into our wanderlust ways. We always wanted to live in another country again, but had put those plans on hold as we settled into our careers and parenthood. With Brian close to burnout, me ready for a career change and our headstrong daughter just out of diapers, it was time to put the plan into action.

Mexico had always been on our radar as a place we wanted to explore. We’d spent many winter holidays on the Sonora and Nayarit coasts, fantasizing about the possibility of living in a Mexican beach town one day. Our research and recommendations from friends led us to the town of Chacala, Nayarit, where there was a promising-looking Montessori school, a beautiful beach and surfing nearby.

We had already been saving up for years for a move like this. Once we found our landing spot, we spent another six months planning the final stages of our transition. In July 2015, we left our jobs, pulled our daughter out of daycare, packed our stuff and dog into our 4-Runner, took a long road trip from our home in Colorado down the Pacific Coast of California and Baja California, ferried to the mainland and arrived in Chacala in November 2015. We only intended to stay in Mexico for one year and then return to Colorado.

Life in Mexico has been filled with new experiences and new skills. (Debbie Slobe)

But after about nine months, with a taste of a slower life filled with more joy, family time, and countless trips exploring the country, we didn’t want our time in Mexico to end. So we figured out how to work differently, support ourselves and build a new home base here. We’ve been living in Mexico for over eight years now. What was originally a one-year plan in response to our midlife crisis has turned into our midlife awakening.

Living in Mexico has awakened us to:

The thrill of living in a different culture and expanding our ideas on how the world and society works
Our ability to flex and flow in a new and unpredictable environment
Our ability to problem solve using a different language, customs and systems
The understanding that art and artistic expression are basic human needs
Our inner creativity as artists, writers, musicians, collectors and makers
The realization that there is always time for celebration, no matter what day of the week or hour
The simplicity of living without the constant pressure to consume and compete
The joys of unstructured, unplanned playtime with friends and family

These are some of the many reasons we have chosen to stay in Mexico and the skills we have gained here. That is not to say we don’t miss our friends and family in the U.S. We do – very much. And that is not to say that life in Mexico is all roses all the time. It’s certainly not. But, at the end of the day, when we calculate the costs and benefits of this new life, we always decide to stay.

If you are feeling a midlife crisis looming and the pull of the possibility of a new life in Mexico, lean into the pull. You may be surprised at what it awakens in you.

Debbie Slobe is a writer and communications strategist based in Chacala, Nayarit. She blogs at Mexpatmama.com and is a senior program director at Resource Media. Find her on Instagram and Facebook.

Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD confirms plans to manufacture in Mexico

By

MND Staff

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February 29, 2024

4

387028693_318690834352185_3154281519051159937_n — As trav. (BYD/Facebook)

Chinese electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer BYD is forging ahead with its plans in Mexico: the company has now confirmed it will open a plant here and on Wednesday launched a new EV in the Mexican market as it seeks to grow its sales outside China.

BYD Americas CEO Stella Li told Reuters on Wednesday that the Shenzhen-based company is looking for a suitable location for its Mexico plant, which she said will make 150,000 vehicles per year for the Mexican market.

BYD plant — Chinese automaker BYD is reportedly considering opening an electric vehicle manufacturing plant in Mexico. (BYD)

Her confirmation of BYD’s decision to establish a factory in Mexico comes two weeks after BYD México country manager Zhou Zou said the company was considering the idea.

Li, one of Time magazine’s “100 most influential climate leaders in business for 2023,” said that BYD anticipates deciding on a location for its Mexico factory by the end of the year.

While she didn’t say when the plant might open or how much BYD planned to invest in the new facility, Li did reveal that the company is looking for sites in central and southern Mexico, rather than in the north of the country.

Jorge Vallejo, the general director of BYD México, told the news site Mexico Industry that the company is looking at parts of the country where there is already an established automotive sector. The automaker is seeking the location with the “best conditions,” taking things such as local infrastructure and the availability of labor into account, he said.

The company will reportedly seek to establish their new plant in the central or southern regions of the country. (BYD/Facebook)

Li told Reuters that BYD’s Mexico plant will only make vehicles for the Mexican market — in which Chinese car sales surged last year — and that getting them to consumers would be more costly if production was in the north of Mexico.

“Our plan is to build the facility for the Mexican market, not for the export market,” she said.

United States officials and U.S. automakers are concerned about the entry to the U.S. of comparatively cheap Chinese vehicles — including ones made in Mexico — due to the threat they pose to the American automotive industry and its workers.

Asked by Reuters whether officials in Mexico had raised those concerns, Li only responded that they had been receptive to BYD’s plan to open a plant here.

Citing unnamed experts, Reuters reported that “cost advantages for BYD come from its early investment in EV technology and a high degree of vertical integration the company has achieved over the years.”

In the final quarter of last year, the company sold 520,000 EVs to become the world’s top electric vehicle manufacturer by sales, overtaking Tesla. The vast majority of those sales were in China, but BYD is now looking to get more of its EVs onto streets in other parts of the world.

To that end, the company launched its Dolphin Mini EV in both Mexico and Brazil on Wednesday. BYD plans to sell the electric hatchback — the most compact of its “Ocean Series” — for 358,800 pesos (about US $21,000), or less than half the price of the cheapest vehicle currently made by Tesla.

“It’s affordable … so every Mexican can bring their first electric car home,” Li said at a launch event in Mexico City.

BYD launched it’s Dolphin Mini EV in Mexico earlier this week. (BYD)

Vallejo said the company — which entered the Mexican market last April — hopes to sell 50,000 Dolphin Minis in Mexico this year.

BYD’s sales in Mexico are “doubling monthly,” according to Reuters, but Li said that the company still faces challenges in convincing Mexicans to purchase EVs. The fact that Mexico does not yet have a vast network of charging stations is one significant barrier to increased adoption of EVs.

In addition, “a lot of hard work” is required to “educate” Mexican consumers about EVs, Li said.

A number of automakers have recently announced plans to make EVs in Mexico. They include Volkswagen, Solarever Electric Vehicles (another Chinese company) and Tesla, which plans to build a new “gigafactory” near Monterrey, Nuevo León.

Tesla intends to make a new low-cost EV in Mexico after first beginning production of the planned US $25,000 “next-gen” model at its Austin gigafactory. Perhaps that vehicle will help the Elon Musk-led company compete with BYD on price in a Mexican EV market that still has plenty of room to grow.

Musk has expressed concerns about Chinese automakers’ access to the United States and other markets, saying in January that “if there are no trade barriers established, they will pretty much demolish most other car companies in the world.”

BYD, Reuters reported, “may bring aggressive price cuts to Mexico, just as it has done in its home market, forcing rivals to slash costs to keep up.”

With reports from Reuters, Mexico Industry and Milenio