• Secretary Guajardo will participate in the Second Edition of the North American Competitiveness and Innovation Conference.
  • Business meetings will be held with business leaders, academics and important stakeholders in North America.

Mexican Secretary of the Economy, Ildefonso Guajardo, is conducting a working visit to Toronto, Canada to participate in the second edition of the North American Competitiveness and Innovation Conference (NACIC), which aims to analyze strategies for increasing the competitiveness of North America.

Secretary Guajardo will attend a working meeting with business leaders, academics and important stakeholders in North America. He will also meet with his counterparts from Canada and the United States, Edward Fast and Penny Pritzker, respectively, to address priority issues in economic relations and areas of cooperation, in order to deepen ties in the region.

Additionally, the three Ministers will hold an open public meeting in which they will address the challenges that lie ahead for North America and the importance of advancing the competitiveness of the region from a trilateral perspective.

In 2013, the countries that form the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) accounted for 27% of the global GDP and 15% of global trade. Last year, trade between Mexico, the US and Canada amounted to a trillion dollars, 3.7 times the trilateral trade recorded in 1993, the year before the NAFTA entered into force.

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Secretary of the Economy concludes working visit to Toronto, Canada

Mexican Secretary of the Economy Ildefonso Guajardo Villarreal concluded his two-day working visit to Toronto, Canada, where he participated in the Second Edition of the North American Competitiveness and Innovation Conference (NACIC). He was accompanied by the Undersecretary of Foreign Trade, Francisco de Rosenzweig, and by Ambassador Francisco Suárez Dávila.

While in Toronto, Secretary Guajardo attended a breakfast organized by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives (CCCE), an organization that brings together executives from leading Canadian companies.

During the event, he referred to the economic reforms being promoted by the government of President Enrique Peña Nieto and their contribution to increasing the competitiveness of Mexico and North America.

As part of this visit, Secretary Guajardo met with his counterparts from the US and Canada, Penny Pritzker and Edward Fast, respectively, to address priority issues of Mexico’s economic agenda with those countries.

Secretary Guajardo Villarreal and his Canadian and US counterparts held a private meeting, in which they reviewed the progress of work performed by departments of the three governments in 2014 under the North American Competitiveness Work Plan, and proposed new actions to be included in the plan in 2015.

The head of the Secretariat of the Economy also participated, along with his North American counterparts, in a luncheon organized by the CCCE, which dealt with topics including the economic outlook for the region, North America’s share in global production processes, and the major challenges facing the region in the current international economic context.

During the lunch, Secretary Guajardo announced that the next edition of the North American Competitiveness and Innovation Conference will take place in Mexico, and expressed the commitment of the Secretariat of the Economy to contribute to actions that strengthen the productive integration of North America, to the benefit of the societies of the three countries.

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STATEMENT BY MEXICO, CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES ON THE NORTH AMERICAN COMPETITIVENESS AND INNOVATION CONFERENCE

Mexican Secretary of the Economy, Ildefonso Guajardo, Canadian Minister of International Trade Edward Fast, and United States Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker, today issued the following statement:

“We, the ministers responsible for international trade and commerce for Canada, the United States and Mexico, held a joint meeting and participated in the North American Competitiveness and Innovation Conference in Toronto, Ontario. The conference brought together business leaders from across North America to discuss our top priorities, which are creating jobs, economic growth, and long-term prosperity for North American businesses, workers and their families.

“This year marks the 20th anniversary of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which laid the foundation for greater economic integration between our three countries. Since then, the Canada, United States and Mexico economies have prospered. Our combined trade relationship is more than $1.4 trillion, and our economic output accounts for more than one-quarter of the world’s GDP. The North American economy can out-compete any region in the world.

“Today, we have pledged to build on this success by enhancing trade and deepening our economic relationship through cooperation on our North American Competitiveness Work Plan. The Work Plan has eight key pillars, all of which aim to increase North American competitiveness. These pillars include trilateral investment initiatives, tourism collaboration, border facilitation, regulatory cooperation, entrepreneurship and innovation, strengthening the North American production platform, stakeholder outreach, and promotion of skills for a 21st century workforce.

“This Work Plan exemplifies how our three countries work together to support North American companies, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises. It also showcases how our countries continue to strengthen our economic partnership, generate prosperity and increase competitiveness on the global stage.”

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