LatinNews Daily - 22 February 2024

*Mexico’s national aluminium chamber (Canalum) has issued a statement rejecting claims that Mexico is a “triangulation bridge” for “products from Asia, particularly China”, to enter the US. The Canalum statement is in response to a virtual meeting which took place on 16 February between US Trade Representative Katherine Tai and Mexico’s economy minister, Raquel Buenrostro, in which Tai “stressed the urgent need for Mexico to take immediate and meaningful steps to address the ongoing surge of Mexican steel and aluminium exports to the US and the lack of transparency regarding Mexico’s steel and aluminium imports from third countries”, according to a USTR statement. Canalum however maintains that Mexico’s aluminium exports to the US have “not varied significantly since 2020” and warns that a trade dispute “would significantly affect value chains on both sides of the border”. The Canalum statement stressed the importance of avoiding “issuing unilateral judgements that damage trade relations, especially at a time when the US has an open case of anti-dumping and subsidy investigations filed by the US Department of Commerce”. Canalum ended its statement with a pledge to “represent, promote, and protect” the interests of aluminium manufacturers in Mexico, a sector which it says represents 2.5% of the country’s GDP and provides over 220,000 jobs.