China broke a record in its participation in imports of products to Mexico, both in all of 2021 and in the first four months of 2022, according to data from the Bank of Mexico.
Last year, China surpassed for the first time the barrier of 100,000 million dollars in exports to Mexico (101,000 million dollars) and thereby reached a 19.9% share of total Mexican imports.
Later, from January to April 2022, Mexico bought products from China worth 38,114 million dollars, with a 20.5% share in the same ratio.
As part of the recent context, on June 2, 2021, the ministers and senior officials of the 11 member countries of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (TIPAT) established a working group for the accession of the United Kingdom to the trade agreement, and China and Taiwan formally applied to join TIPAT on September 16 and 22, 2021, respectively.
Likewise, in 2021, Mexico began the modernization processes of the Reciprocal Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (APPRI) with China.
With ups and downs, China’s share in total imports of Mexican products went from 14.9% in 2011 to 19.9% in 2021.
China mainly exports to the Mexican market telephones, liquid crystal devices, computer parts, integrated electronic circuits, telephones, auto parts, electrical transformers, and parts for telephony and television transmitters and receivers.
As for the Chinese economy, the European Central Bank (ECB) projects that the highest recorded incidence of Covid-19 cases since the start of the pandemic will curb growth in the short term.
While Chinese activity seemed relatively strong in January and February, the rapid rise in the number of Covid-19 cases in March led to widespread lockdowns, which are significantly slowing growth. And local lockdowns imposed by authorities could disrupt even more important supply chains.
Easing traffic congestion in key financial and port cities such as Shanghai and Shenzhen, which account for about a sixth of China’s exports, suggested to the ECB that growth momentum was slowing at the end of the first quarter. With cases on the rise and major cities on lockdown, the economy is likely to continue to slow in the second quarter of 2022.
In bilateral relations, the protocol for the export of Mexican sorghum to China was agreed in 2020 and the speeding up of the work to conclude the sanitary protocols for pork and bovine viscera, as well as the authorization of Mexican meat plants and the access of products Mexican fishing boats to China.
Then, the IX Meeting of the Mexico-China High-Level Group was held on August 19, 2021 and prior to said meeting, meetings of the cooperation subgroups for the promotion and facilitation of bilateral trade were held (August 17, August) and investment (August 18).
Among the topics discussed were the work to conclude the sanitary protocols of interest to Mexico, as well as for the authorization of Mexican meat plants.