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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | January 2005 
Investing In The Homeland
 Houston Chronicle
 Tecolotlán, Mexico — For now, the 20 acres spread before disabled soccer coach Hugo Jimenez and retired airplane parts maker Jose de Jesus Macias are nothing more than fields of corn, interrupted by the occasional cactus. But the two business partners have bold plans for this expanse of cornstalks where they've invested $75,000 of the money they earned working in the United States. By taking advantage of a government program designed to encourage immigrants to invest in their hometowns, Jimenez and Macias plan to build a sports complex, complete with two soccer fields and maybe even some basketball courts.
The Invierte en Mexico program, Spanish for "invest in Mexico," helps budding entrepreneurs navigate the pitfalls of opening businesses in this nation where red tape routinely bogs down business owners. "The idea is to create permanent employment," Jimenez said as he sat in his wheelchair parked alongside a creek that cuts through the property on the edge of Tecolotlán, the indigenous name meaning "land with an abundance of owls." They plan to call their entertainment facility Búho Land, a combination of their native and adopted languages. Búho means owl in Spanish.
Coming to Houston
The program was introduced in California in 2003, and in November immigrants living in Dallas learned about it. By March, government officials plan to unveil the program to Mexicans living in Houston. As part of Invierte en Mexico, the government pays 70 percent of a consultant's fee to write a business plan. If the consultant finds that the business could prove profitable, government officials then help immigrants fill out the permits they need to open their businesses.
"We hold the hand of the migrant," said Omar Ron, coordinator for the program in the state of Jalisco. "Maybe they could have all the money, but all the transactions wipe them out." Invierte en Mexico is one more program that the government, under President Vicente Fox's leadership, has undertaken to capitalize on the more than $13 billion immigrants pumped into the nation's economy last year.
In the last few years, several Mexican states have begun matching contributions made by immigrants for roads, churches or sewage lines, among other projects in their hometowns. But this is one of the few programs helping immigrants build businesses, capitalizing on one of the primary destinations for the cash sent to Mexico. "Almost all Mexican immigrants — their ideal dream is to go back home, live well, retire there and maybe start their own business," said Roberto Coronado, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank in El Paso.
Drawing Them Home
The program targets blue-collar Mexican immigrants who saved their cash for years, like Macias. But it also aims to appeal to Mexican immigrants who already own businesses and want to open ventures south of the border. "Now, successful Mexicans in the United States can build profitable businesses in their homeland," according to the program's slogan.
One of those successful business owners is Francisco Cardenas, who has a construction company and restaurant in Stockton, Calif. He plans to open a Casa Vieja Restaurant and Grill and later a hotel in his hometown of San Luis Soyatlán, off Lake Chapala, where many Americans have retired. "I think it will be more profitable than my business in California," said Cardenas, 45, who plans to cater to American customers.
Though the program has a small budget of just $2.2 million, it's already helped immigrants open a few businesses, principally in the state of Jalisco, where the plan initiated. One such business, Auto Lata, rose from the sugar cane fields in the town of Tala in December. Former nursing home cook Cesar Ruiz beamed during the inauguration of his beer barn, where customers can drive in and purchase Victoria beers, jalapeno-flavored chips or toilet paper, among other items. Many of this town's residents gathered to celebrate the opening of this business, built in the shape of a Quonset hut meant to look like half of a giant beer can. "If my business is successful, I'd be very happy to return to my pueblo," Ruiz said as neighbors and relatives drank beer, ate tacos and listened to blaring music during an opening-day party.
Miles away from the agave-filled fields scattered throughout this tequila-producing state, governments in the nearby states of Hidalgo, Michoacan and Zacatecas are also offering to help immigrants build businesses, such as a hydroponic tomato greenhouse and tourist cabanas.
Beating A Bad Reputation
Though the officials tout these businesses as examples of Invierte en Mexico's success, the government has a poor track record with past programs designed to spur economic development. More than four years ago, Angel Calderon and nearly two dozen immigrants from the state of Guanajuato each invested about $6,000 in a sewing factory in their small village of Timbinal as part of a program called Mi Comunidad, or "my community."
The strategy of creating maquiladoras in immigrant-sending communities was the brainchild of Fox, who was then the state's governor. Calderon and his partners knew little about sewing and even less about running an international business, but the state government promised to appoint a person to help with training and finding clients while the Napa Valley-based immigrants provided the cash. After the 2001 terrorist attacks, work slowed, and the plant where workers once churned out costumes and bags was shuttered. Pleas for help by Calderon were ignored. Officials stopped visiting the plant to help with training and marketing.
"Why invite people to sacrifice their money and not do anything when they all lose money?" asked Calderon, who said he has no confidence in such Mexican government programs. But there are some differences between the two programs. Mi Comunidad relied on a state bureaucrat with no business knowledge, while Invierte en Mexico is backed by Mexican development bank Nacional Financiera, Coronado said. The program combines the small business savvy of the agency with the immigrant's investment, he said.
Slowing Northern Migration
Program officials said they'll consider Invierte en Mexico successful if it creates better jobs and keeps more people from migrating north, Ron said. As it is now, because there are so few jobs in Tecolotlán, many people end up finding work in the United States. Those who remain behind work primarily in agriculture.
As Jimenez and Macias surveyed their land surrounded by the mountains of the Sierra Madre, cattle herders on horseback prodded their cows past what will be the entrance to Búho Land. "We have the initiative and the desire to do it," said Macias, a U.S. citizen who divides his time between this town and his home in McAllen. There's not much competition for the attention of youngsters in the area, Jimenez said.
Indeed, years after the introduction of the VCR, the town's only cinema closed. Now there's nothing for the 16,000 residents to do at night besides stroll the plaza that's surrounded by buildings painted in hues of orange and yellow. "It's a place caught in time," said Jimenez, who returned to his hometown more than 15 years ago, just three years after he dived into a shallow portion of Lake Michigan to retrieve a soccer ball and hit his head. He's been paralyzed ever since. After the accident, Jimenez received a settlement from the Chicago parks department because it hadn't posted a sign near the lake warning people against swimming there.
For his part, Macias sold his home in Los Angeles, walking away with a tidy profit after buying a home in McAllen. Now he's investing some of that profit and his pension in the indoor soccer stadium. Jimenez and Macias plan to invest an additional $100,000 each in the construction of their business But first they'll start with putting in a paved street, Macias said as he pushed Jimenez's wheelchair down the property's dirt road. |
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