LatinNews Daily - 03 February 2022

* The Consejo Coordinador Empresarial (CCE), Mexico’s leading private sector lobby, has warned against the economic impact of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s electricity reform, which seeks to prioritise Mexico’s state-run electricity firm Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE) over private renewable energy companies. Speaking at the ongoing congressional debate on the contentious reform, CCE president Carlos Salazar said that there were currently more than 150 future projects on hold, equivalent to more than US$40bn of investment, because of the uncertainty generated by the reform. “If there is a bigger energy supply, the price will go down, it’s a basic economic principle,” said Salazar. On 25 January, the CFE dismissed as “negative propaganda” criticism levelled at the reform by another private sector lobby, the Confederación Patronal de la República Mexicana (Coparmex), and the Mexican automobile industry association (Amia), who had questioned the CFE’s ability to produce enough energy, and enough clean energy, if the reform were passed.