Mexico will build a TIF (Federal Inspection Type) Trail on the border with the United States that will allow it to export less live cattle and more meat to the US market.
The announcement was made this Thursday by the Secretary of Agriculture and Rural Development, Víctor Villalobos Arámbula.
The TIF Trail will be located in the municipality of Agua Prieta, Sonora, and will help boost livestock production in the border area and provide added value to Mexican cattle.
The official stressed that the TIF Trail will be a pilot model to be replicated throughout the border.
While Mexico exports 1 million 200,000 head of cattle per year, the federal government promotes external sales of cuts with added value.
The governor of Sonora, Alfonso Durazo Montaño, explained that the design of the business plan includes private investment and the incorporation of the producers themselves as partners and that a cooperative society is eventually organized.
Sonora has 23 Federal Inspection Type establishments, where meat products are slaughtered, cut, boned, transformed, and stored.
The main activity is the slaughter of the swine species.
Of the total, 15 TIF establishments in the state are authorized to export to the United States, Canada, Korea, Japan and China.
Live cattle
Villalobos stressed that Mexico exports 1,200,000 head of cattle per year and «we want to reduce that amount and send cuts with added value, in a strategy that will begin this year.»
In the framework of his work tour, Villalobos said that the project does not consider only the maquila, but also includes an entire development of animal health, with support from both sides of the border, where Mexico will do the same through the Service National Health, Safety and Food Quality (Senasica).
The federal official indicated that the land where the TIF Trail will be built, with an area of up to 10 hectares, is suitable due to its strategic location.
In addition, he explained that it is a binational project derived from the interest of both nations, due to the demand for meat products in the United States and the need for labor that they have not been able to satisfy and that the governor of Sonora saw as a great opportunity and it is beginning to take shape.
