Irapuato's Fundación Calosa has been making art more accessible for Mexican everywhere, with displays, courses and even offering the chance to start their own collections. (Fundación Calosa)
Located in the heart of Irapuato, Guanajuato, the Fundación Calosa exists as an essential reference for contemporary art in the Bajío. Founded seven years ago with the mission of democratizing access to art, this non-profit organization has managed to consolidate itself as a space for meeting, dialogue and artistic education. Its impact goes beyond the exhibition of first-rate works: the Fundación Calosa seeks to transform the perception of art and encourage collecting in a region where the cultural offering of this type is limited.
Historically, Mexico’s cultural offerings have been concentrated in Mexico City, leaving other regions with less access to world-class contemporary art exhibitions. This impacts both artists and consumers, since artists have to travel to Mexico City to show their artistic work or to attend major exhibitions. Fundación Calosa has taken on the challenge of decentralizing the Mexican art scene by offering a space where national and international artists can exhibit their work without having to travel to the capital.
Espacio Calosa, the gallery in which the foundation is based, has become a model for how private initiatives can contribute to the dissemination of art and culture in the country. “Our goal is to bring art closer to more people, offering first-rate exhibitions and an educational program at no cost,” explains Lorena Chávez, founder of the institution and a businesswoman committed to the transformative force that access to art can have on people’s lives and minds.
A space for the community
The Fundación Calosa is not only an exhibition center but also a place to meet and learn. Its educational program includes workshops, wine tastings, and activities for children and emerging artists. Events such as Calosa Niños seek to engage new generations in art appreciation, while Noches Calosa allows adult visitors to explore the exhibitions at extended hours, prioritizing socializing and dialogue around art and taking into consideration the long work shifts that people usually have in this part of the country.
World-class exhibitions: Chiharu Shiota at Calosa
Chiharu Shiota’s series “The Soul’s Journey” is now on display at Calosa. (Fundación Calosa)
One of the foundation’s most recent accomplishments is the recently inaugurated exhibition “The Soul Journey” by renowned Japanese artist Chiharu Shiota. Famous for her monumental installations created with webs of interwoven threads, Shiota offers a unique sensory experience that explores memory, the body and human emotions. This exhibition is free, reflecting Calosa’s commitment to accessibility and artistic quality.
“To experience art is to embark the soul on a journey, to explore the depths of human consciousness. As visitors tour the exhibition at Fundación Calosa, they will engage with various works of art that deal with life, death and connection. The purpose of art is to look beyond our mundane lives”, says Chiharu Shirota about her exhibition at the Espacio Calosa.
This exhibition will be open to the public at no cost until June, and you can visit Monday through Friday.
One of the foundation’s pillars is to encourage art collecting as a tool for social transformation. “Supporting living artists is fundamental. Buying art is not only an aesthetic act, but also a political one; it is a form of support for the hard work and research involved in creating,” Lorena Chávez told Newsweek En Español earlier this year. The Foundation has promoted the acquisition of works by emerging artists, demonstrating that it is possible to start a collection with an accessible budget.
From its headquarters in Irapuato, the Calosa Foundation is redefining the art scene in the Bajío and beyond, functioning as an example for similar spaces outside Mexico City. Its work not only challenges Mexico’s cultural centralization but also inspires other initiatives to follow. In a country where art is often perceived as a luxury for the few, projects like Calosa demonstrate that culture can and should be accessible to all.
Camila Sánchez Bolaño is a journalist, feminist, bookseller, lecturer, and cultural promoter and is the former Editor in Chief of Newsweek en Español magazine.
President Claudia Sheinbaum at her daily press conference on Thursday. (Graciela López/Cuartoscuro)
A diverse range of issues were discussed at President Claudia Sheinbaum’s Thursday morning press conference, including the gruesome Teuchtitlán case (see MND’s latest report here) and the latest World Happiness Report (see our article here).
Reporters also asked questions about Cuban doctors in Mexico, the soon-to-be enforced ban on junk food in schools and the United States’ protectionist agenda.
Cuban doctors have been filling gaps in medical personnel in Mexico since at least 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, like this doctor at Hospital Tláhuac in Mexico City in 2020. (Rogelio Morales/Cuartoscuro)
Cuban doctors not taking jobs from Mexicans, Sheinbaum says
In response to a question about the government’s hiring of doctors from Cuba, Sheinbaum said, “It is very important for people to know that they don’t substitute Mexican doctors.”
Sheinbaum said that Cuban doctors were hired to take up specialist positions in parts of the country where Mexicans don’t want to go.
No matter how many recruitment processes are undertaken, “There are no Mexican doctors who want to go to these places, many of which are in the most isolated places,” she said.
Sheinbaum said Thursday that Mexico needs Cuban doctors because Mexican ones won’t work where needed. However, this protest by Health Ministry workers a year ago echoes many Mexican public doctors’ frequent complaints that government-run facilities lack medicines and adequate equipment to treat patients successfully. (Crisanta Espinosa Aguilar/Cuartoscuro)
Jorge Alcocer, health minister in the previous federal government, said in 2022 that doctors had cited insecurity as the main reason why they didn’t want to work in rural areas of the country, but he also claimed that they were not interested in living in remote areas.
“They’re forgetting … the right patients have to be attended to wherever they are,” Alcocer said at the time.
Despite previous claims to the contrary, Sheinbaum said that Mexico has a shortage of doctors in some specialist fields of medicine.
“We already spoke about why there are not [enough] specialists in Mexico — because for years, the entire neoliberal period, [previous governments] closed off the possibility of there being specialist doctors,” she said, referring to the period between 1982 and 2018.
“It wasn’t until 2019 or 2020 that [former] president López Obrador doubled the training [opportunities] for specialist doctors,” Sheinbaum said while presenting a graph to support her point.
She also expressed her appreciation for the work Cuban doctors do in Mexico and told reporters that she has seen them at work herself during her weekend trips to different parts of the country.
Sheinbaum says that Mexico has a shortage of specialist doctors, although this has been disputed. (Graciela López/Cuartoscuro)
Sheinbaum said she has also witnessed the “gratitude of the people” they have treated.
Ban on junk food in schools to take effect this month
“How will you monitor compliance with this provision?” the reporter asked the president.
Sheinbaum referred the question to Deputy Education Minister Noemí Juárez Pérez, who said that the Education Ministry is “already working with school supervisors” to ensure compliance with the ban.
“… They are our most direct eyes, and we’ll be using and needing their support a lot. They’re our supervisors,” she said.
Education Minister Mario Delgado explaining the plan to ban junk food from the nation’s schools back in October. (Moisés Pablo Nava/Cuartoscuro)
Juárez also said that vendors of food in schools will receive training on “the products that can be sold” and “those that can’t be sold.”
“… The vendors already have some recipe books [and] guidelines about the preparation of products,” she added.
“… What we want is to provide options more than a limitation. … It’s about what healthy options can be offered in schools,” Juárez said.
According to regulations published in the government’s official gazette late last year, food offered at schools must comply with a range of requirements, including that they be of natural origin or minimally processed and that they be cooked (if required) with a minimal amount of oil.
The reform “seeks to shift children’s eating habits away from unhealthy Mexican staples, including chilaquiles, tacos de canasta and quesadillas,” Mexico News Daily reported in October. “School cafeterias are advised not to serve these types of meals to students.”
Schools that don’t comply with the rules will be subject to fines of up to 5,450 pesos (US $270).
Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard and his team headed again to Washington, D.C. Thursday for tariff talks with U.S. officials. (File photo/Twitter)
Mexico seeking to avoid additional US tariffs
Sheinbaum noted that the government is still waiting to see how Mexico will be affected by the reciprocal tariffs the United States intends to impose on imports from all its trading partners on April 2.
“We’re always seeking an agreement and that Mexico is affected as little as possible,” she said.
“But if not, we have a plan, and we’ll speak clearly about what this would mean,” said Sheinbaum, who has expressed confidence that Mexico will avoid reciprocal tariffs because it doesn’t tax most imports from the United States.
“We’re always going to seek dialogue [with the United States] and to look after the [USMCA trade] agreement, which very much helps Mexico but also helps the United States a lot,” she said.
The jury is in: Mexicans are reportedly among the world's happiest people, placing value in family connections, children and emotional well-being over financial status, according to one report. (Victoria Valtierra/Cuartoscuro)
Mexico has been named the third happiest country in the world, according to the Happiness Index 2025, released this week by Ipsos, a global market research and polling company.
With 21% of respondents considering themselves “very happy” and 61% “somewhat happy,” Mexico checks in with a total of 82% in those two categories, trailing only India (88%) and the Netherlands (86%). It was ahead of Indonesia and Brazil (both 79%) in the top five.
In addition to experiencing happiness now, 76% of Mexicans surveyed by Ipsos said they believed their life would be even better than now in five years. (Ipsos)
In the same index last year, Mexico, at 83%, placed second behind the Netherlands’ 85% and ahead of Indonesia and India, both at 82%.
The Ipsos survey focuses on self-reported happiness and explores factors contributing to happiness and unhappiness — such as family, relationships and financial situations.
Tight-knit intergenerational families appear to be an important factor in Mexicans’ happiness, according to Ipsos’ data. (María Martínez/Cuartoscuro)
Family and children are the most important contributors to happiness in Mexico, cited by 45% of respondents. Feeling appreciated and valued follows at 34%, reflecting the importance of interpersonal relationships in Mexican culture.
Mental health and well-being also play crucial roles, with 32% of respondents highlighting these factors. Physical health (cited by only 28% of respondents) and financial situation (23%) were less prominently valued.
Married Mexicans reported higher levels of happiness (87%) compared to singles (13%), and employment significantly impacts happiness, with 84% of employed individuals feeling happy versus 16% of the unemployed.
This year’s 30-nation average shows 16% of respondents worldwide as “very happy” — putting Mexico five percentage points above the world average — and 55% as “somewhat happy,” for a total world happiness score of 71%.
Globally, reported happiness has been declining in the index over the past 14 years, with 15 of the 20 countries surveyed in 2011 reporting lower happiness levels today.
Although globally, happiness has been declining, according to Ispos’ report, Mexico stayed more or less at the same level of happiness or improved in comparison to other countries: In the United Nations’ World Happiness Report, Mexico made a leap from a ranking of No. 25 last year to No. 10 in 2025. (Moy Ortega/Shutterstock)
Canada (67%) took the No. 22 rank this year after placing No. 18 last year (71%). It has dropped 18 percentage points since 2011.
Turkey, the happiest country in 2011, has dropped 40 percentage points to 49%, making it the second-least happy nation in the 2025 survey, ahead of only Hungary (45%). The rest of the bottom five is occupied by Germany (64%), Japan (60%) and South Korea (50%).
Mexico makes a big leap in the UN Happiness Report
The World Happiness Report is compiled through a partnership involving Gallup, the Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre and the U.N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network.
It conducted its most recent survey across 147 countries, compared to 30 for the Ipsos study.
In this study, Finland nailed down the No. 1 ranking for an eighth straight year, while the United States fell to No. 24 — its lowest ranking in this survey’s 25 years of existence.
Denmark, Sweden, Iceland and the Netherlands rounded out this year’s top five, with Costa Rica placing sixth to top all Latin American and Caribbean countries.
“In Mexico and Europe, a household size of four to five predicts the highest levels of happiness,” the study noted. “Couples who live with at least one child, or couples who live with children and members of their extended family, have especially high average life satisfaction.”
The report also found that “sharing meals with others is strongly linked with well-being across all global regions,” noting that “the number of people dining alone in the United States has increased 53% over the past two decades.”
"This won't be [another] Ayotzinapa," Attorney General Alejandro Gertz Manero promised at his Wednesday press conference on the Teuchitlán case. (Galo Cañas/Cuartoscuro)
Mexico’s Attorney General Alejandro Gertz on Wednesday asserted that Jalisco state authorities were negligent in their investigation of a ranch linked to a notorious drug cartel, but vowed to discover what went on there.
In vowing to uncover the truth, Gertz provided a litany of irregularities in the state investigation.
A volunteer search collective discovered what has been described as an extermination camp at Izaguirre Ranch in Teuchitlán, Jalisco. (Fiscalía del Estado de Jalisco/Cuartoscuro)
State authorities did not test human remains at the site or properly identify the clothing and shoes found there, Gertz said. They also failed to register evidence or fingerprints and did not process vehicles found at the ranch, three of which were later stolen.
Local authorities didn’t investigate the ownership of the ranch, failed to scientifically analyze alleged crematorium locations and did not investigate local officials who were linked to activities at the ranch, he said.
Gertz also claimed Jalisco officials failed to alert federal authorities — as is standard procedure — even though the National Guard was involved in the September 2024 operation that originally discovered the camp.
Warrior Searchers of Jalisco uncover an ‘extermination camp’ in Teuchitlán
The discovery of what seemed to be underground ovens led to speculation that the site may have been used to cremate bodies, prompting headlines about “an extermination camp” at a “ranch of horror.”
The government has acknowledged that there are roughly 115,000 people missing in Mexico, largely as a result of drug cartel violence.
Workers from the Special Prosecutor’s Office on Missing Persons (FEPD) sort through personal items found alongside human remains at Izguirre Ranch in Teuchitlán. (Fiscalía Jalisco/Cuartoscuro)
The possibility that the ranch near Teuchitlán was a systematic extermination camp has caused a deep sense of horror, although Gertz claimed the evidence with regard to crematoriums is inconclusive.
The scandal has cast a shadow over the nascent administration of President Sheinbaum, who pledged to crack down on violence and reduce homicides during her Oct. 1 inauguration.
Her comment was prompted by media speculation that Teuchitlán could become her “Ayotzinapa,” referring to the disappearance of 43 students in September 2014 and the failure of federal authorities to adequately resolve the case. Activists commemorated the 10th anniversary of Ayotzinapa last September, just days after the Teuchitlán ranch was first found by authorities.
Search groups and rights experts told The Associated Press that Sheinbaum’s measures were largely already reflected in current or past laws with few new concepts to push the needle forward.
Additionally, activists and search groups are worried that the Teuchitlán investigation is being mishandled, though Gertz said his office was planning to grant access to the site to members of the public and journalists.
Search collectives from Jalisco protesting in February in Mexico City, saying the government is ignoring their cases despite Jalisco being the number one state in Mexico for forced disappearances. (Galo Cañas Rodríguez/Cuartoscuro)
More than 150 search collectives, activists and relatives of victims of abduction and enforced disappearance have expressed profound concern about President Claudia Sheinbaum’s response to Mexico’s missing persons crisis.
The open letter to the president reacted to Sheinbaum’s announcement Monday of six “immediate actions” against enforced disappearances. Her announcement followed a weekend of vigils for Mexico’s disappeared. (Mario Jasso/Cuartoscuro)
The actions she announced include strengthening the National Search Commission (CNB) and establishing new protocols that allow “immediate” search alerts to be issued when a person is reported as missing.
In an open letter to the president that seethes with anger and frustration, the search collectives, activists and relatives of missing persons responded to each of the six actions (see below).
The March 18 letter begins with an unequivocal denunciation of Sheinbaum’s plan.
“The families of missing people watched and listened to your response in the face of the disappearances crisis that is getting worse every day. We are deeply concerned about the proposal you make as it reflects a lack of knowledge about the institutional mechanisms and procedures that already exist in the country in search and investigation matters,” said the letter endorsed by search collectives including the Brigada Nacional de Búsqueda (National Search Brigade) and Buscando Nuestros Desaparecidos (Searching for our Missing Ones).
🗣️“Nos preocupa profundamente la propuesta que hace”: Más de 150 colectivos y activistas suscribieron una carta de respuesta al plan de seis puntos presentados por la presidenta @Claudiashein para atender la crisis de personas desaparecidas, en el que lamentan su desconocimiento… pic.twitter.com/7LcSE3JNYn
The response to Sheinbaum’s plan to strengthen the National Search Commission
The search collectives and relatives of victims said it was “positive” that a decision taken last year to reduce the funding of the CNB has been reversed.
“However, it cannot be expected that the increase in the budget and capacities [of the CNB] will achieve anything effective with a head like Teresa Guadalupe Reyes Sahagún,” the letter said.
The search collectives asserted that Reyes — who became head of the CNB in late 2023 after the resignation of Karla Quintana — has a “clear technical incapacity” to occupy the position she holds. She is a former federal deputy who worked in the Welfare Ministry during the first three years of Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s presidency.
NCB head Teresa Guadalupe Reyes Sahagún was appointed by former president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in 2023 after the sudden resignation of former NCB head Karla Quintana, a human rights expert currently heading the Independent Institution on Missing Persons in the Syrian Arab Republic. (Galo Cañas Rodríguez/Cuartoscuro)
The collectives also said that Reyes hasn’t demonstrated an openness to dialogue “with the victims of this country.”
They said that “a forceful action” would be to “correct the mistake” of appointing Reyes to the role of CNB chief and subsequently selecting a new head via an election in which “the right of the families to participate is guaranteed.”
Felipe Calderón-era initiative won’t resolve crisis
The response to Sheinbaum’s legislative reform proposals
The search collectives and relatives of victims said that “reviving the initiative” of former president Felipe Calderón (2006-12) to use a person’s CURP I.D. number as their sole source of identity won’t “immediately resolve the crisis of disappearances.”
Sheinbaum said Monday that a reform to the General Population Law in order to “consolidate” a person’s CURP identity number as their “only source of identity” would allow a missing person’s CURP to be checked against “all administrative records in the country” in order to “generate alerts that facilitate the identification of signs of life.”
Arturo Medina, a deputy minister in Mexico’s National Search Commission, defends the commission at President Sheinbaum’s daily press conference on Tuesday. (Gustavo Alberto/Cuartoscuro)
The search collectives were also critical of a proposal by Sheinbaum to create new missing persons databases, saying that for the past eight years there has been an “obligation” to create a “National Forensic Data Bank,” but the Federal Attorney General’s Office “has refused to implement” it.
Missing persons problem due to ‘lack of political will to break impunity pacts’
The response to Sheinbaum’s initiative to establish new protocols that allow “immediate” search alerts to be issued
“We reiterate that the problem of disappearances and failures in the search and investigation [procedures in missing person cases] doesn’t come from the absence of laws and protocols but rather the lack of political will to break impunity pacts that persist in the country,” the search collectives and victims’ families said.
They claimed that prosecutor’s offices are “the first obstacle” to commencing searches for missing persons.
The collectives said that the law already stipulates that searches “must be immediate” after a person is reported as missing, contradicting Sheinbaum’s assertion that authorities in some states are required to wait 72 hours before initiating searches and investigations.
A search collective in Quintana Roo comforts a member who has personally searched for her missing daughter for the past five years after she disappeared from Cancún in 2020. Victims’ families say that authorities are often an obstacle to locating missing persons rather than a help, especially if those authorities were secretly in collusion with the perpetrators. (Elizabeth Ruiz/Cuartoscuro)
‘We are concerned that the crime of disappearance will be made invisible’
The response to Sheinbaum’s plan to put the crime of enforced disappearance on the same level of seriousness as kidnapping
The search collectives and relatives of victims said that one of their “biggest struggles” was establishing “the crime of enforced disappearance” in federal law.
They said that “for a long time,” they “have understood that the search for our relatives responds to different dynamics” than those in a search for victims of kidnapping.
While a kidnapping and an enforced disappearance are similar crimes, the latter occurs with the authorization, support or involvement of authorities. The abduction of a person by a crime group that colludes in one way or another with authorities, whether they are municipal, state or federal authorities, could be classified as an enforced disappearance rather than a kidnapping.
Sheinbaum’s proposal to put enforced disappearance on the same level as kidnapping in terms of seriousness would increase the maximum sentence for a person convicted of the former crime by 20 years to 80 years.
Mexico’s notorious mass disappearance case of 43 kidnapped college students from Guerrero, often referred to as the Ayotzinapa 43, is an example of the Mexican government’s frequent paralysis in solving enforced disappearances. The case has gone unsolved for over a decade despite multiple investigations launched by successive presidential administrations that have implicated cartels, the military, and local politicians. (Dassaev Téllez Adame/Cuartoscuro)
The search collectives and victims’ relatives said that the proposal is “clear proof of not understanding criminal dynamics as well as a clear backward step in terms of investigation.”
“The problem of disappearances can’t be resolved if they are investigated as if they are any crime, and we are concerned that [the crime of] disappearance will be made invisible and its victims dealt with incorrectly,” they said.
“That’s why we strongly reject the proposal.”
‘We hope that this proposal is established’
The response to Sheinbaum’s plan to publish missing persons statistics on a monthly basis
“We hope that this proposal is established, that it allows us to see the level of work of the prosecutor’s offices,” said the search collectives and relatives of victims.
They said that the published data should not just include how many people have disappeared on a monthly and even daily basis, but also show many have been found and how many missing person cases are reaching a court of law. Just 1% of such cases are currently heard by a judge, the search collectives said.
Collectives call for dismissal of heads of victims’ commission
The response to Sheinbaum’s plan to strengthen the Executive Commission for the Attention to Victims
A search collective member in Chilpancingo, Guerrero, heads home after a day without success of looking for missing persons’ remains at suspected clandestine gravesites. (Dassaev Téllez Adame/Cuartoscuro)
The search collectives and relatives of victims said they hoped that the strengthening of the Executive Commission for the Attention of Victims (CEAV) isn’t just a matter of increasing its budget.
The heads of the commission “must have knowledge of the issue” of kidnapping and enforced disappearances and “sensitivity to attend to victims, not just a personal closeness to those who appoint them,” the letter said.
In light of the alleged nepotism, the search collectives and relatives of victims called for top CEAV officials to be dismissed.
Government ‘hasn’t shown interest in consulting us’
In the conclusion to their scathing letter, the search collectives and relatives of victims asserted that “like all the governments in Mexico,” the current government “hasn’t shown real and serious interest in consulting us and establishing constructive dialogue.”
President Sheinbaum said Wednesday that she would meet with the collectives and family members “if necessary,” but stressed that Interior Minister Rosa Icela Rodríguez has been attending to them and will continue to do so.
In their letter, the collectives and relatives also called on government advisers to inform Sheinbaum and other high-ranking officials about “the mechanisms, institutions, procedures and laws that already exist” with regard to missing persons, as the president and other top functionaries have only shown “ignorance on the issue and/or … [the] intention to deceive.”
“… The responsibility to search for and find [missing persons] continues to be yours as a government, and public servants are one of the main obstacles to finding our missing family members,” the letter said.
“If this continues to be tolerated, the problem won’t be solved. Because while the buildings of government are closed and fenced in, the families are looking for our relatives that were disappeared and abandoned by the Mexican state,” it concluded.
Tala offers loans ranging from 500 pesos to 10,000 pesos, with fixed interest rates start at 11%, a point and half above Mexico's current benchmark interest rate of 9.5%. (Tala)
Tala, a United States-based microlender that offers small loans to clients in Mexico and a few other countries, announced on Wednesday that it has secured a US $150 million debt facility to expand its business in Mexico.
“This facility will support the company’s rapidly growing business in Mexico,” Tala said.
“Tala intends to use the proceeds from this facility to enhance its lending capabilities and fuel its ongoing mission to deliver truly scalable, data-enabled financial infrastructure,” the company said.
“… With initial committed capital of US $75 million, the facility enables Tala to draw up to US $150 million, making this Tala’s largest capital markets transaction to date and underscoring the strength of its operations and growth trajectory in Mexico,” Tala said.
In an interview with Reuters, Tala’s CEO and founder Shivana Siroya said that many of the company’s clients in Mexico are owners of small businesses. She said that Tala has more than 3 million clients in Mexico and provided loans worth more US $500 million in the country last year.
Tala CEO and founder Shivana Siroya. (Fintech Association of Kenya)
She said that the capital Tala will be able to access via the debt facility “is for the growth of our Mexico business.”
“As we think about how to widen access, it’s … starting to talk about different platforms, embedded partnerships,” Siroya told Reuters.
“The second piece is, how do we provide more value? “So whether that’s higher [credit] limits, more dynamic pricing, starting to think about specific credit products,” she said.
According to Tala’s Mexico website, the maximum loan is currently 10,000 pesos (about US $500) while the minimum is 500 pesos (US $25). The duration of personal loans ranges from 15 to 61 days and fixed interest rates start at 11%.
Clients can apply for loans using Tala’s mobile app, and the company says the loans can be approved in minutes without checking a borrower’s credit history.
Siroya said that Tala’s average loan in Mexico is about 2,300 pesos (US $114).
Tala also offers loans in Kenya, India and the Philippines.
Siroya told Reuters that there is “more to come this year” for Tala in Latin America, indicating that it will expand into other countries in the region.
The payments will go to suppliers, including small businesses along the Gulf Coast and in Chiapas.(Mario Jasso/Cuartoscuro)
State oil company Pemex plans to settle a debt with suppliers totaling up to US $6.4 billion between March and April, according to Rocío Abreu, the head of the Chamber of Deputies’ Energy Commission.
Abreu told the newspaper El Economista that the figure represents about a quarter of its total debt to suppliers.
“This month, we will disburse US $3 billion followed by $3.4 billion next month,” Abreu said in an interview with El Economista during the commemoration of the 87th anniversary of the state oil company’s expropriation at the Pemex Tower in Mexico City.
“We’re working with Petróleo Mexicanos, but also with the Finance Ministry, to ensure this benefits small, medium-sized, and large businesses,” she said.
As for the origin of the funds, Abreu explained that while part of the funding comes from Pemex, the federal government will also contribute. Additionally, a bank factoring plan allows those with outstanding debts to convert their invoices into collectible assets backed by Pemex’s promise of payment.
Pemex local suppliers in Ciudad Carmen, Campeche, last year protested the lack of payment by the state oil company — a recurring problem in past years. (Petroleros al Aire)
At the end of last year, Pemex’s debt to suppliers exceeded US $25 billion, reaching historic highs with a 26% annual increase.
According to El Economista, Pemex’s supplier debt increased after President Claudia Sheinbaum took office in October of last year. The new administration temporarily paused several payments to review their origins and negotiate agreements with the Finance Ministry to avoid placing an overwhelming short-term financial burden on Pemex.
In an interview with Radiofórmula, Rafael Espino de la Peña, president of the Mexican Association of Petroleum Service Companies (Amespac) — which includes multinational companies such as Baker Hughes, Emerson, Halliburton, and Grupo México — said that Abreu’s statement is encouraging.
“Any payment is welcomed. It is always encouraging to hear that a payment will be made, but we’re waiting for it to actually happen,” he said.
Espino noted that Pemex made no payments in the last three months of the previous administration — which ended in September 2024 — and that the situation remains unchanged since Sheinbaum took office, as unnecessary reviews of payment delays occurred despite each project having a budget allocation for contracting.
According to Espino, SMEs have shut down due to insufficient financial resources as they awaited payment. He also noted that the recent drop in Pemex’s liquid hydrocarbon production is linked to a reduced supply of goods and services caused by the company’s failure to make payments.
“[Lack of payment] seriously compromises production,” Espino highlighted “Production has been declining because [capital expenditures] were reduced.”
Mexico and Canada last met in September, a dynamic face-off that resulted in a draw. (FMF)
Mexico’s national soccer team squares off against Canada Thursday night for the Concacaf Nations League (CNL) semifinals, a match of considerable significance for coach Javier Aguirre and his squad.
El Tri tangles with the Reds at SoFi Stadium outside Los Angeles with a trip to the CNL championship game on the line. The victor advances to Sunday’s final to face the winner of the Panama-USA semifinal contest, which will be played earlier Thursday afternoon.
The teams will face off Thursday night at the SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. (Concacaf)
Mexico has reached two of the three previous CNL finals, losing both times to team USA. Canada has one CNL final on its résumé, also losing to the U.S.
Aguirre — in his third stint as El Tri boss — would like nothing more than to come home with the hardware since this might be the only time he has a top-choice roster at his disposal until the 2026 World Cup.
This summer’s Concacaf Gold Cup coincides with the FIFA Club World Cup, and participating Liga MX sides Monterrey, León and Pachuca are permitted to add six reinforcements each. It is not inconceivable that national team players would be popular targets.
As such, though a loss to Canada would not be the death knell for Aguirre, it could cause palpitations at Soccer Federation headquarters. Executives there are desperate for positive results ahead of a World Cup which Mexico will co-host.
Extended Highlights: Mexico 2-1 Canada - Gold Cup 2021
Historical dominance on the wane?
Mexico has won 21 of 36 matches against Canada, losing just five times, and El Tri has not lost a knock-out game to Les Rouges in 25 years. In those 36 games, Mexico has outscored Canada 75-24.
In fact, Mexico is on a three-game winless skid against Canada, including a stunning 2-1 loss to the Reds in a November 2021 qualifier.
In the last meeting between these North American rivals on Sept. 10, 2024, Canada battled El Tri to a scoreless draw in an entertaining, though chippy contest, that each team believed it should have won.
And last year, Canada’s coach, the American Jesse Marsch, guided the Reds to a surprise fourth-place finish in the 2024 Copa America, the best finisher among Concacaf clubs.
Game notes
Thursday’s match marks the first time Mexico and Canada meet in the CNL Final Four, but it will be their seventh clash in Concacaf tournaments. El Tri won five of the previous six.
Mexico might be seen to have a slight advantage with regard to fitness Thursday night.
Of Aguirre’s 23-man squad, 10 players are based in Europe with 13 performing for LigaMX sides. On the other side of the pitch, 15 of Jesse Marsch’s players ply their trade in Europe while the remaining eight play in MLS, which just kicked off its season.
Head coach Javier Aguirre returned last year for his third go at leading the Mexican men’s soccer team. (Fernando Carranza García/Cuartoscuro)
European leagues are heading down the stretch run of their seasons and Liga MX clubs have already played 12 games, but each MLS side has played just four matches. As such, the eight Canadians playing in MLS might not be in ideal game-shape just yet.
Still, Canada boasts two stars with UEFA Champions League experience this season. Striker Jonathan David (Lille) and speedy wingback Alphonso Davies (Bayern Munich) are difference-makers.
Other key contributors are midfield general Stephen Eustaquio (Porto) and Cyle Larin (Mallorca). Eustaquio played briefly with Mexico’s Cruz Azul.
Mexico will rely on polished goalkeeping from Luis Malagón (América) and defensive leadership from midfielder Edson Álvarez (West Ham) and center-back Johan Vásquez (Genoa).
Veteran striker Raúl Jiménez (Fulham) will likely be called upon to lead the attack with wingers César Huerta (Anderlecht), Alexis Vega (Toluca) and Roberto Alvarado (Chivas) tasked with generating offense.
Pedro Ramírez Vázquez had an unparalleled career, with his most famous buildings, such as the National Anthropology Museum, defining the Mexico of today. (Architectuul)
What do the logo of the 1968 Mexico City Olympic Games, the National Museum of Anthropology and History and the Azteca Stadium have in common? They were all (at least partly) designed by Mexican architect Pedro Ramírez Vázquez, the man responsible for modernizing Mexico.
Originally from Mexico City, Vázquez designed many of Mexico’s most iconic Modernist monuments during the 1960s and 1970s. His influence in modern Mexico went beyond his role as an architect — he also served as an urban planner and government official, playing a significant part in the country’s transition toward modernity.
Pedro Ramírez Vasquéz, the man behind many of Mexico’s most defining megaprojects. (INAH)
“To think of him as somebody who designed buildings is not to take account of all the roles he played,” Luis Castañeda, a professor of art history at Syracuse University, told the New York Times in a 2012 interview. “He wasn’t the one constructing the models or sketching the drawings; he was the one securing the commission from the president.”
Who was Pedro Ramírez Vázquez?
Ramírez was born on April 16, 1919, in the dying months of the Mexican Revolution. After graduating from architecture at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) in 1943, he became a professor of urban design and planning at the Faculty of Architecture.
When Ramírez’s mentor, the politician and intellectual Jaime Torres Bodet became Minister of Education, Ramírez was selected to help develop a low-cost, prefabricated prototype for classrooms and teacher housing. This prototype was used for decades at thousands of rural school sites.
A young Pedro Ramírez Vázquez (left) and Jaime Torres Bodet (right). (Pedro Ramírez Vázquez )
He then held various teaching and public service positions throughout Mexico and was the founder and first rector of the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana (UAM). Ramírez also served as Minister of Human Settlements and Public Works from 1976 to 1982 during the government of José López Portillo.
What did Pedro Ramírez Vázquez design?
In 1962, Ramírez completed his masterpiece: the National Museum of Anthropology and History, commissioned by President Adolfo López Mateos. The museum is renowned for its large water feature in the center of its esplanade, a suspended concrete cover, and the lattices that control shades of light into the interior facades of the rooms.
Mexico City’s Anthropology Museum was Ramírez’s magnum opus, and is one of the country’s most recognizable monuments to modernism. (Evan Wise/Unsplash)
Over six decades, Ramírez built other notable landmarks like the Legislative Palace of San Lázaro, the Basilica of Guadalupe — Mexico’s largest pilgrimage site — and the national headquarters of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (which ruled Mexico from 1929 through 2000), and the Museum of the Templo Mayor, among others in Mexico City.
He also designed the logo for Televisa, Mexico’s largest telecommunications corporation.
Outside of Mexico, he designed the International Olympic Committee Headquarters building in Lausanne, Switzerland, Mexican pavilions at several World’s Fairs, the Nubian Museum in Egypt and the Chapel of Our Lady of Guadalupe inside St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City, among others.
His most personal project would be his own house and studio, built in 1958 in the affluent Mexico City neighborhood of El Pedregal. Located south of Mexico City, the neighborhood sits over a solidified lava field and was developed by renowned architect Luis Barragán. It remains one of the capital’s most desirable areas to this day.
Ramírez’s home in El Pedregal. (World of Interiors)
With simple geometric buildings featuring flat roofs and natural materials, El Pedregal seemed like a natural place for Ramírez to build his residence. On one side of the property he built his studio, currently filled with books, pre-Columbian figures, and a yarn painting of his 1968 Olympic logo. On the other side he built his house, where he died on his 94th birthday, on April 16, 2013.
His participation as the head of Mexico’s Olympic Committee
Ramírez led the creation of the largest and most effective graphic and advertising campaign ever developed in Mexico during his time as head of the organizing committee of the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City.
“We had to show that we had a graphic language of contemporary communication and Mexican cultural expression,” he said in an interview with Código Magazine in 2008. “We knew that language was not enough. We had to show [Mexico’s image as a modern country] with facts.”
However, despite the enormous success of the design campaign, Ramirez’s image was marred after he defended Mexico’s government over the events of the Tlatelolco student massacre of 1968, which he claimed had been exaggerated by the press.
Reagardless of scandal in his nature country though, Ramírez continued to receive various major accolades, such as the National Art Prize in Mexico (1973) and the Olimpiat Prize, awarded by the International Olympic Committee in Atlanta (1996), and the Life and Work Award by Obras Cemex (2003).
He was also named Doctor Honoris Causa by several universities including the UNAM.
Gabriela Solis is a Mexican lawyer turned full-time writer. She was born and raised in Guadalajara and covers business, culture, lifestyle and travel for Mexico News Daily. You can follow her lifestyle blog Dunas y Palmeras.
One beachside convenience store has captured Mexican hearts. Of course it's an Oxxo. (Perfíl Veracruz/Instagram)
If you’ve ever stepped foot in Mexico, you’ve likely encountered one of the country’s most surprisingly defining features: an Oxxo.
With more than 20,000 outlets across the country, they’re one of the few 24-hour convenience stores you can head to in a moment of need. The iconic corner shop — with its hard-to-miss red, yellow and white facade — is seemingly infinite, with locations along the busiest urban streets to every stillwater pueblo. Often, you might walk past an Oxxo just to be greeted by the next, only a few intersections away. And if you’ve lived in Mexico long enough, you’ve probably frequented your neighborhood Oxxo — a one-stop shop for water, snacks, toiletries and monthly phone charges. I am an unabashed racker-up of Oxxo points.
No convenience store (or maybe any store at all) is more ubiqutous for Mexicans than the Oxxo. (Wikimedia Commons)
And yet, despite their sheer ubiquity and de facto symbolism of national identity, they’re not all exactly alike. In fact, there’s specifically no Oxxo like the one located in Boca del Rio, Veracruz. That’s because the increasingly popular location is a one-of-one singularity with an array of funky offerings and unbeatable real estate that has already captured the attention of Mexican customers, social media influencers and regional outlets.
The main draw? It’s located at the land’s end, on the edge of Mexico’s eastern shore, with a natural vista point of the Gulf of Mexico’s extensive horizon and its flanking Malecón that leads to the famous port of Veracruz. It’s practically on Playa Boca Del Rio, a popular beach just south of the city of Veracruz and around the corner from a pirate museum. For Jarochos — the people of Veracruz, known for their seafood and diving skills — it’s fitting, if not essential, to have an Oxxo on the beach. And it draws both out-of-town visitors and regular patrons from the community alike.
It’s one thing to step foot inside a traditional, nondescript Oxxo in Mexico City or Guadalajara, but the Boca del Río Oxxo is making rounds on local news and among Mexicans, who seem to appreciate its coastal quirks. Apart from the killer view with a calming sea breeze — there are benches placed outside of the shop with a panorama of the water — this Oxxo apparently offers Zumba classes. As if that’s not enough, fresh elotes are regularly sold in the outside lot.
The magic doesn’t end there. This past February, for Valentine’s Day, this specific location transformed into an Instagram-friendly lover’s lane, playing on the “XOXO” factor of their name and adorning their storefront with giant neon hearts, a heart-shaped sunglasses-wearing Cupid and an entirely pink and red paint job. The seasonal effort drew even more visitors and further cemented the Boca del Río outlet’s reputation as the best, if not most outlandish Oxxo in all of Mexico. Though the decorations have gone down, plenty of videos have circulated of them.
Once heralded as a tourist destination, the port of Veracruz’s allure has declined in recent decades much in the way Acapulco’s glory days are behind it as a party-going Mexican beach town for socialites. But Veracruz still retains a handful of gems,lechero-loving coffee culture notwithstanding.
I recently visited the city with my mom, who grew up in the state capital of Xalapa, about 90 minutes from the famous port. It was a drenchingly hot afternoon, the kind of heat where you have no choice but to take your shirt off, and as we were making our tourist rounds, strolling the beach, I suddenly came face to face with the quirky shop.
At the time, I hadn’t known that it was a cult favorite for locals, but you can imagine how heaven-sent it feels on a day like that to be blessed with a shop where you can pick up a cold beverage without leaving the beach. It’s the kind of thing that feels like a mirage. Afterwards, I kept wondering to myself if it actually existed; if that Oxxo was real or a dream. Trust me, when you walk in heat like that for kilometers, you’ll start to question lots of things. It wasn’t until I recently saw it popping up all over Mexican social media accounts that I remembered how cool (and uncommon) that vibrant little beach hut Oxxo is.
It’s not much, but here in Veracruz, any spot with air conditioning and beverages is welcome in unexpected moments.
Alan Chazaro is the author of “This Is Not a Frank Ocean Cover Album,” “Piñata Theory” and “Notes From the Eastern Span of the Bay Bridge” (Ghost City Press, 2021). He is a graduate of June Jordan’s Poetry for the People program at UC Berkeley and a former Lawrence Ferlinghetti Fellow at the University of San Francisco. His writing can be found in GQ, NPR, The Guardian, L.A. Times and more. Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, he is currently based in Veracruz.
