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Blog Category: Michael Camuñez

Spotlight on Commerce: Michael C. Camuñez, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Market Access and Compliance

Submitted on October 15, 2012 - 5:00pm
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Guest blog post by Michael C. CamuÑez, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Market Access and Compliance, International Trade Administration

Ed. note: This post is part of the Spotlight on Commerce series highlighting members of the Department of Commerce and their contributions to an Economy Built to Last.

Guest blog post by Michael C. Camuñez, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Market Access and Compliance, International Trade Administration

As Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Market Access & Compliance, I have the great privilege of working each day to advance the President’s trade policy agenda to grow U.S. exports and help American industry compete in foreign markets under the President’s National Export Initiative. In a world where 95 percent of consumers and 80-90 percent of world GDP growth will exist in coming years outside of the United States, our work to grow U.S. exports has never been more important. I feel fortunate to have the opportunity to work with my talented colleagues at Commerce and throughout the government on efforts to keep the United States globally competitive and to help to increase our access to these dynamic and emerging global markets.

I am a fourth-generation American, born and raised in southern New Mexico, not far from the U.S.-Mexico border. I am the descendant of Mexican farmers and ranchers, who settled in northern Mexico and what is today the States of New Mexico and Texas. My family left New Mexico for sunny California just as I entered high school. I spent my high school years in California’s San Joaquin Valley, one of our nation’s most productive agricultural regions. 

I was the first in my family to attend college and was lucky enough to earn a spot at Harvard College. While at Harvard, I became deeply involved in organizing and running community service programs aimed at working with at-risk populations. That led to an opportunity following college to help advocate for the creation of a nation-wide system of national service—like a domestic Peace Corps.  In fact, my first political job was in the Clinton Administration, where I was an integral part of the team that established the AmeriCorps program. 

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Trading Across the Border – The United States and Mexico’s $1 Billion per Day Relationship

Submitted on October 31, 2011 - 5:00pm
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Juan Carlos Baker, Director General of Mexico’s Secretariat of Economy with Hector Mancha Ana Hinojosa, Director of Field Operations, El Paso Field Office with Michael Camuñez, Assistant Secretary for ITA’s Market Access and Compliance.

Guest blog post by Michael Camuñez, Assistant Secretary for ITA’s Market Access and Compliance

Last year, trade between the United States and Mexico amounted to nearly $400 billion. With 85% of that trade crossing the border each day by truck, the U.S.-Mexico border region plays a vital role in the U.S. economy. And it is open for business.

This is the message I heard last Wednesday through Friday when I visited the El Paso, Texas/Ciudad Juarez, Mexico region.

As Americans, we hear a lot about our southern border, little of it positive. Drugs, violence, and illegal immigration are what we see on television and read in the newspaper. While such stories may be in the media’s economic interest, I want to share an entirely different story that is in every American’s economic interest.

Two-way trade between the United States and Mexico amounts to more than $1 billion a day. To put the scope and depth of our relationship in perspective, consider that last year U.S. exports to Mexico exceeded our exports to Brazil, Russia, India and China combined. Remarkably, even our imports from Mexico support U.S. jobs—64% of the content of the Mexican goods we import include U.S. inputs. The continued growth of this relationship is vital to the America’s economic recovery.

And that is exactly why I went to the border—to discuss how infrastructure investments and improvements in customs procedures can facilitate increased trade.

To emphasize the need for a shared approach, I asked Juan Carlos Baker, Director General of Mexico’s Secretariat of Economy, to join me. Together, we met with many of the principal exporters on both sides of the border—maquiladora executives representing the Mexican private sector and U.S. small and medium sized business owners who comprise the maquiladoras’ supply chain. We had excellent discussions with both groups and received useful feedback, which we will incorporate into our respective government’s efforts to grow trade along our southern border.
 
We also visited The Bridge of the Americas, one of the busiest ports of entry on the entire U.S.-Mexico border where we were briefed by senior U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials regarding the challenges of advancing our dual interests: security and commerce. We communicated industry concerns and gained useful information that will inform our efforts on behalf of our respective private sectors.

Along the way, we also discussed some of the untapped potential of the border region, particularly that in renewable energy. I spoke at the U.S.-Mexico Border Energy Forum Plenary Session, where I offered insight into Commerce’s efforts to develop this sector.

What is most important is that we not lose sight of the importance of the U.S.-Mexico border to the U.S. economy and to our global competitiveness. We share much more than a border with Mexico. Our societies and cultures are inextricably linked—I should know, my family came from Mexico generations ago and settled in the border region, right near El Paso. Those ties present an enormous opportunity from which we must not be distracted.