Back

COMEXI-PCNS webinar series 2024: Nearshoring boom: lessons from Mexico and Morocco

May 30, 2024
Related topics: 

Nearshoring in Mexico

Nearshoring in Mexico presents both importance and challenges for businesses. The country's proximity to the United States, its largest trading partner, offers strategic advantages such as reduced transportation costs and shorter lead times, making it an attractive destination for nearshoring operations. Additionally, Mexico boasts a skilled labor force, particularly in industries like automotive, aerospace, and electronics manufacturing, which align well with the needs of many nearshoring companies. Moreover, Mexico benefits from trade agreements like the USMCA (United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement), providing preferential access to key markets. However, nearshoring in Mexico also faces challenges, including security concerns in certain regions, bureaucratic hurdles, and regulatory complexities that may impede the ease of doing business. Infrastructure constraints, such as inadequate transportation networks and energy supply, can increase operational costs and pose logistical challenges for companies. Addressing these challenges while leveraging Mexico's strategic advantages is crucial for maximizing the potential of nearshoring in the country.

Nearshoring in Morocco

Nearshoring in Morocco is significant due to its proximity to Europe. This stability, coupled with developed infrastructure and efficient logistics, facilitates seamless operations and reduces investor uncertainties. It offers advantages like reduced transportation costs and access to a skilled workforce, particularly in the engineering and IT sectors. Trade agreements and government investments in infrastructure support nearshoring activities, making Morocco attractive for European companies to optimize their supply chains. The country's political stability, developed infrastructure, and efficient logistics bolster its appeal to investors. Macro factors such as trade openness and stable exchange rates further enhance its attractiveness. Moreover, Morocco boasts solid legal frameworks that prioritize and protect business rights and economic incentives, ensuring a stable and predictable business environment. However, challenges persist, including skill mismatches, technology transfer, and SME upgrading. Addressing these, alongside pressing concerns like achieving carbon neutrality and digitalizing the economy, is essential for Morocco to fully leverage its potential as a competitive nearshoring hub and sustain its appeal to foreign investors.

Importance of the webinar

In this context, the exchange of experiences and lessons learned between Mexico and Morocco is instrumental in bolstering their nearshoring opportunities and overcoming challenges in this domain. By sharing insights into their respective nearshoring endeavors, both countries can leverage each other's strengths and address common obstacles more effectively. Through collaboration and knowledge sharing, COMEXI and PCNS can contribute to identifying innovative solutions, actionable strategies, and the maximal capitalization of trends in the global nearshoring landscape. This exchange can also result in ideas that foster mutual growth and competitiveness in the nearshoring sector, that help drive economic development and create new opportunities for both nations.

RELATED CONTENT

  • MODELING LAND USE AND THE EFFECTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN BRAZIL
    Authors
    Eduardo Amaral Haddad
    Weslem Rodrigues Faria
    February 22, 2017
    This paper discusses the development of a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model with detailed specification for land use. The model considers two aspects of land use: land as a measure of production cost and land as a physical entity that can be used in a variety of ways. To analyze the economic effects of climate change, we integrated the CGE model and an econometric model. The results based on this model, which captures how land allocation responds to changes in temperature a ...
  • Download PDF
    MOROCCO-BRAZIL ECONOMIC RELATIONS: Current situation and strategies for a deeper relationship
    Authors
    Sandra Polónia Rios
    Pedro da Motta Veiga
    Eduardo Augusto Guimarães
    February 22, 2017
    Despite the sustained growth in the bilateral trade observed at the beginning of the Century, Moroccan – Brazilian economic relations are still going through what could be called the ‘shallow’ phase of relations between two middle-income countries. Trade is concentrated in a few products – those where both countries enjoy long lasting and natural comparative advantages – and face strong difficulties to diversify in terms of products and to upgrade towards more complex models of lin ...
  • Download PDF
    Returning foreign terrorist fighters: An imminent threat to manage
    Authors
    Abdelhak Bassou
    February 15, 2017
    During the last quarter of 2016, terrorism specialists were still busy with the issues of counter-radicalization, indoctrination, and the dangers of young recruits departing to tension hotbeds, when the question arose about the return to their countries of origin by those who have experienced war and acquired significant combat capabilities. For nearly the past decade, they have been flocking to Syria and Iraq from around the world. ...
  • Download PDF
    Retour des combattants terroristes étrangers : Une menace imminente à gérer
    Authors
    Abdelhak Bassou
    February 15, 2017
    Au dernier trimestre de l’année 2016, les spécialistes du terrorisme étaient encore occupés par la contreradicalisation, l’endoctrinement et les dangers des départs des jeunes recrues vers les foyers de tension, alors que la question du retour chez eux commençait déjà à se poser, dans leurs pays d’origine, de ceux qui ont expérimenté la guerre et acquis d’importantes capacités de combat. Ils avaient dès les débuts de la deuxième décennie afflué en Syrie et en Irak de partout dans le ...
  • Download PDF
    Will America Trigger a Global Trade War?
    Authors
    Uri Dadush
    February 9, 2017
    The new Trump administration is openly protectionist. The President called for “America First” and for “Buy American, Hire American” in his inaugural speech and his subsequent actions dispelled any remaining doubt that he meant what he said during the election campaign. As promised, he has withdrawn from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an agreement among twelve countries across three continents that took nearly 10 years to negotiate. He has threatened American companies that invest a ...
  • Download PDF
    Accumulation du capital et gains de productivite au Maroc
    Authors
    Taoufik Abbad
    February 3, 2017
    La réflexion développée dans cet ouvrage part d’un constat alarmant et pressant. Le processus continu et renforcé de l’accumulation du capital, dans lequel s’est engagé le Maroc depuis les années 2000, a permis certes de préserver la stabilité des équilibres fondamentaux et d’amortir les différents chocs exogènes, aussi bien internes qu’externes, mais il n’a pas permis d’insuffler un accroissement plus important des gains de productivité et d’accélérer la transformation de la base p ...
  • Download PDF
    Relations entre le Maroc et l’Afrique subsaharienne : Quels potentiels pour le commerce et les investissements directs étrangers ?
    Authors
    Rim Berahab
    February 1, 2017
    L’analyse des relations commerciales entre le Maroc et l’Afrique subsaharienne fait ressortir un volume des échanges croissants, reflétant ainsi une dynamisation continue des leurs relations commerciales. Une tendance similaire est observée au niveau des investissements directs étrangers, qui ne cessent de croître au cours des dernières années, traduisant la volonté du Maroc à devenir un acteur majeur dans le développement du continent africain. Ce Policy Brief présente dans un prem ...
  • Download PDF
    Relations between Morocco and sub-Saharan Africa: What is the potential for trade and foreign direct investment?
    Authors
    Rim Berahab
    February 1, 2017
    An analysis of trade relations between Morocco and sub-Saharan Africa indicates a growing volume of trade, reflecting a continuation of stimulated trade relations. A similar trend is observed in foreign direct investment (FDI), which has continued to grow in recent years, reflecting Morocco's determination to become a major player in the development of the African continent. This Policy Brief first presents trends in inter-regional trade between Morocco and sub-Saharan Africa, focus ...
  • The Brazilian Debt Hangover
    Authors
    Otaviano Canuto
    January 25, 2017
    In previous pieces, we have analyzed the run up to the still-ongoing Brazilian recession as a combination of factors. Given an “anemia” of productivity increases, an appetite for public spending without prioritization led to a condition of fiscal “obesity”. The external factors that provided for a boom in the new millennium, notwithstanding underlying vulnerabilities, have dissipated. The economic policy adopted as a response to the growth decline aggravated those vulnerabilities. O ...
  • Download PDF
    Coopération contre la criminalité transnationale: Cas de la Zone de paix et de coopération de l’Atlantique Sud
    Authors
    Mostapha Mouzouni
    January 23, 2017
    Alors que la menaces, que la criminalité transnationale organisée présentait dans les années 70 était considérée comme étant secondaire, le changement de sa nature, l’augmentation de ses risques et sa stigmatisation de plus en plus soutenue comme étant responsable des instabilités politiques et de certains conflits internes, a poussé la communauté internationale à s’inscrire dans une logique de confrontation avec ses aspects les plus menaçants à la sécurité internationale. Or curieu ...