E-commerce Services & Digital Economy - Mexico

AMEXCID and the Office of the Presidency of Mexico (in charge of the National Digital Strategy) provide technical cooperation to member countries of the Mesoamerica Project to promote the participation of Central American countries in the Latin American Digital Agenda under the eLAC2019 mechanism. The “Regional Digital Market” workshop took place on November 7th-8th, 2016 and presented the eLAC2019 initiative to Central America, highlighting the advantages of promoting network and service expansion and the access to online good and services. Mexico is currently exploring the possibility of including Mesoamerica in a base study on the current digital market in Latin America.

The OECD Ministerial Meeting on Digital Economy held in Cancun, Mexico addressed four major themes:

• Internet openness & innovation;

• Trust in the digital economy;

• Building global connectivity; and

• Jobs & skills in the digital economy.

The objective of the Ministerial Meeting was to subscribe to the OECD Digital Economy Declaration, which establishes guidelines of public policy for the development of the digital economy in the coming years. As a result of the declaration, the following is settled:

“RECOGNISE that the digital economy is a powerful catalyst for innovation, growth and social prosperity; that our shared vision is to promote a more sustainable and inclusive growth focused on well-being and equality of opportunities, where people are empowered with education, skills and values, and enjoy trust and confidence;

RECOGNISE that advancing our vision relies on the participation of all countries and on collective action to seize the opportunities and tackle the evolving challenges of the digital economy;”

Furthermore, the statements 2 and 4 establish the following:

“2. Stimulate digital innovation and creativity to spur growth and address global social issues through coordinated policies that promote investment in digital technologies and knowledge-based capital, encourage availability and use of data, including open public sector data, foster entrepreneurship and the development of small and medium enterprises, and support the continued transformation of all economic sectors, including public services;

4. Embrace the opportunities arising from emerging technologies and applications such as the Internet of Things, cloud computing, digital transformation of manufacturing and data analytics, while addressing their economic and social effects, and assessing the appropriateness of policy and regulatory frameworks, and of global standards.”

Every participating country at the OECD Ministerial Meeting recognized the importance of new technologies, and reinforce their commitment to take advantage of the opportunities emerged by technological changes.

In conclusion, Mexico and other OECD members are aware of the importance of encouraging digital economy and digitization as engines of growth and social welfare and of the need to develop measures and policies capable of encouraging the development of smart industries, industry 4.0, as well as the digitalization of society and every economic sector.

Mexico has participated in the following initiatives carried out by the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).

• “APEC FTAAP Capacity Building Workshop dealing with scheduling of Market Access Commitments in Services Trade and Investment” (Seoul, Republic of Korea, June 27-20, 2016). The workshop addressed topics related to the schedules in services trade and investment. Schedules are regarded as one of the most complicated and technical areas and important field in the FTA negotiations. Meanwhile, government officials directly involved in the Free Trade Agreements (FTA) negotiations and trade policy makers had the opportunity to share their experiences and difficulties during negotiations.

• “Capacity Building Workshop on Negotiations of Services Chapters under FTAS with a Negative List Approach” (19, 20 and 21 August 2016 – Lima, Peru). Mexico shared its experience on e-commerce chapter to provide information about the structure of an e-commerce chapter, key provisions, relation with the non-conforming measures and relations with other chapters.

• Capacity Building Needs Initiative (CBNI) Seminar on Electronic Commerce Chapter of the RTAs/FTAs (Nha Trang, Vietnam, on February 22, 2017). The objective was to share Mexican experience regarding the negotiations of e-commerce chapter of FTAs and RTAs, and the disciplines negotiated and the level of ambition.

Workshop on Trade on Services (March 1-3, 2016, Mexico City). This workshop was addressed to all the government officials who are directly involved in trade on services. The objective was to gain a broader understanding on the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) of the World Trade Organization and on the commitments that Mexico has made related to international trade in services.