Mexico considering methods to support steel, textile industries

Mexico's legislature on Friday flagged it could embrace measures to secure its steel and material ventures as President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said makers had been left "defenseless" by past organizations. Towards the finish of January, the legislature picked not to recharge a 15 percent levy on steel imports from 2015 that shielded Mexico's steel industry from rising Asian imports, particularly from China. The legislature likewise enabled taxes to descend for imports of material and footwear items from nations with which Mexico has no exchange understandings. Notwithstanding, Lopez Obrador alluded to a U-turn on those moves. "It's being reviewed," Lopez Obrador told a standard news meeting when inquired as to whether he would take any defensive measures or bolster financial impetuses for the ventures following the lapse of the past protections. "We don't concur with what was done in the neo-liberal time frame, which saw an unpredictable opening unbounded and left household makers unprotected," he said. "We'll survey this case, continually contemplating securing national industry." Lopez Obrador portrays the organizations that ruled Mexico from the mid-1980s onwards as "neo-liberal." Mexico's steel industry has been pushing for government support since the organization of U.S. President Donald Trump slapped duties on imports toward the finish of May. Agents from industry drew consolation from the president's words on Friday. "We significantly welcome what Mr. Lopez Obrador says in light of the fact that it gives us trust that taxes could come back to past dimensions," Alejandro Gomez, official director of the national footwear industry affiliation, told columnists in the province of Guanajuato. Independently, the Mexican economy service said in an announcement that the legislature was auditing "elective measures" to help the businesses following gatherings with delegates from the steel, material and footwear divisions.

• [Editor:janita]