New Strategies for the Mexican Petrochemical Industry

Abstract

It is necessary to  define  new strategies for  achieving  a proper  growing  and  development of  the  Mexican Petrochemical  Industry. As  each  product  can  be used  as a  final product or as  raw  material  the  influence of  its  production is remarkable  all over  the  national   production chains.    Petrochemicals in Mexico  have  been   classified  as  basic  and  secondary  ones,  by  political  reasons. These two groups allowed   governmental   institutions   to   regulate   private  activity versus public activity in this sector.  At  the  beginning,   the  first  group was devoted to the  first  chemical transformation  and  the  secondary one  to   subsequent transformations.  For last 30   years, petrochemical industry has not been developed as the Mexican people wanted. The trends showed that total production has remained at the same level, many installations   were left out of  service and  imports  grow  very  fast.  The official  explanations  to justify the  present  situation of Mexican Petrochemical  industry  are diverse  :   low  investments,  reduced  scale  sizes   of  plants  and  uncertainty in government rules  for  new  investors and   for  gas price as  a  raw  material. These   are the main reasons which explain the lack of competitiveness in the global  market  That  is  why  this  paper  focuses  the strategic  problem  of  how to rescue  this  industry  and how   to  promote  a  new  outline  for achieving the  desired  development.