经济学人双语精读：中国企业为何涌向墨西哥

2024年3月29日 文摘

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The southern strategy
南方策略

Why Chinese companies are flocking to Mexico
中国企业为何涌向墨西哥

The country offers a back door to the United States
该国为通往美国开了个后门

Chinese investments have been pouring into Mexico lately. Last month alone brought two notable ones. The government of Nuevo León, a northern state bordering the United States, announced that China’s Lingong Machinery Group, which makes diggers and other construction equipment, would build a factory that it estimates will generate $5bn dollars in investment. The same day Trina Solar, a solar-panel manufacturer, said it would invest up to $1bn in the state. Both companies and their corporate compatriots can now find a home away from home at Hofusan, a Chinese-Mexican industrial park in Nuevo León.
近来中国投资大量涌入墨西哥。仅10月就有两起值得注意的事件。在墨西哥北部与美国接壤的新莱昂州，州政府宣布，生产挖掘机和其他建筑设备的中国临工重机将在该州建设一座工厂，预计将带来50亿美元的投资。同一天，太阳能电池板制造商天合光能表示将在该州投资多达10亿美元。现在，这两家公司及其他中国企业都可以在新莱昂州的中墨合作的华富山工业园安家落户。

  • pour 通常指从高向低或从上向下的急剧流动，也可作引申用

Chinese companies’ heightened interest in Mexico dates to 2018 when Donald Trump, America’s president at the time, launched a trade war that included raising tariffs on imports from China. His successor, Joe Biden, has kept the tariffs in place. Mr Biden’s own America-first policies, such as the Inflation Reduction Act, are encouraging companies to consider “nearshoring” in North America, in large part to thwart China. The pandemic and the snarl-ups in supply chains it caused also pushed manufacturers to move closer to the American market. And setting up in Mexico has begun to look cheaper, as wages and other costs in China rise.
中国企业对墨西哥兴趣大增可以追溯到2018年，当时的美国总统特朗普发起了贸易战，措施包括提高对中国进口产品的关税。他的继任者拜登维持了加征的关税。拜登自己提出的《通胀削减法案》等美国优先政策正在鼓励美国企业考虑在北美展开“近岸外包”，很大程度上是为了挫败中国。疫情及其造成的供应链混乱也促使制造商向美国市场靠拢。随着中国的工资和其他成本不断上涨，在墨西哥设点开始显得更便宜了。

Mexico has tried to lure Chinese money before. The Mexico-China Chamber of Commerce and Technology organised events in 2008 to encourage the flow of capital but they were unsuccessful, says the chamber’s César Fragoz; back then China had no need to use Mexico as a way into America, which had yet to turn its back on Chinese companies. “The irony is that the first to react positively to an explicit policy against China are Chinese firms,” says Enrique Dussel Peters of the Centre for Chinese-Mexican Studies at UNAM, a university in Mexico City.
墨西哥以前尝试过吸引中国资金。墨西哥中国商业科技商会的塞萨尔·弗拉格兹表示，该商会在2008年组织了一些活动鼓励中国资本流入，但没有收到成效。当时美国还没有背对中国企业，中国不需要通过墨西哥进入美国。墨西哥城的墨西哥国立自治大学中墨研究中心的恩里克·杜塞尔·彼得斯表示：“吊诡的是，最先对明确针对中国的政策做出积极反应的是中国的企业。”