McCarrey Law Group NAFTA

Since 1994, the barriers to trade among the NAFTA countries of Canada, Mexico and the United States have been significantly reduced and the time is fast approaching when all significant barriers to trade among these countries will be eliminated. In addition, many of the barriers to service providers have also diminished with banks, mortgage banks and other financial institutions generating significant earnings in their neighboring countries. Never has there been a better time to take a business across a border.

Notwithstanding the relative ease of doing business throughout North America, there are new levels of legal complexity and regulation to navigate. For instance, Mexico is a civil law jurisdiction while the United States and Canada are common law adherents. Even among common law countries, the statutory and regulatory schemes vary greatly and the differences among all of the NAFTA countries are astounding.

We have been transacting business in Mexico since the passage of NAFTA and have helped Fortune 75 companies obtain the proper authorizations to establish country operations. In addition, our lawyers have been intimately involved in the development of real estate in Mexico and can help developers considering going to Mexico shorten the process of acquiring and entitling real estate. This can be particularly helpful if fluency in Spanish is an issue.

In an action that has elicited widespread response from disparate groups including the Teamsters and conservative think tank Judicial Watch, the Bush administration during the week of February 20, 2007 announced a plan to send U.S. inspectors to Mexico to check freight trucks. Vehicles and drivers that pass the 22 point safety audit will then be permitted to cross the border and deliver loads anywhere in the United States. This was announced as a pilot program, but the eventual goal is to open the border to additional traffic as called for by the North American Free Trade Agreement (“NAFTA”). Mexico reciprocated by announcing that the trucks from 100 U.S. trucking companies will be permitted to enter Mexico.