By JULIÁN AGUILAR
Published: January 7, 2012
![]()
Andrés Manuel López Obrador: The candidate of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (P.R.D.).
Texas
politicians are paying close attention, too - to whether the trade,
security and energy policies of President Felipe Calderón's successor
will affect illegal immigration or the state's robust trade relationship with Mexico.
Three Texas customs districts, Laredo,El Paso and Houston,
rank among Mexico's top four trading partners. Collectively, they
accounted for roughly $235 billion in trade between Texas and Mexico
from January to September 2011, according to United States Census data
analyzed by WorldCity, which tracks global trade patterns. The figures show an increase over 2010 despite the American recession and unprecedented violence in Mexico because of warring drug cartels.
Gerardo Schwebel,
the executive vice president of International Bank of Commerce's
international division in Laredo, said the future of this booming trade
relationship partly depends on what investors anticipate for the peso.
Though Mr. Schwebel and other analysts speculate that Mexico will not
see a major devaluation similar to what it experienced three
presidential elections ago, when political, social and economic factors
plunged the country into a financial crisis, he warned that its currency
is still volatile.
"The
reason behind that is, the uncertainty of Europe and the U.S. economy
have added pressures to the Mexican peso," Mr. Schwebel said. He added
that the Mexican customer must constantly measure whether to make
payments in dollars, or whether to wait and see if the peso gets weaker
or stronger, depending on what the transaction is.
Major
reforms carried out in Mexico since 1994, the last year the
Institutional Revolutionary Party, or P.R.I., won the presidency, have
prevented the peso from plummeting as it did that year.
"Today
it's a completely different scenario in the sense that Mexico's central
bank has very deep national reserves," said Roberto A. Coronado, an
economist at the El Paso branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
Mr. Coronado said that as of December, Mexico had $140 billion in
foreign exchange reserves, plus a line of credit with the International
Monetary Fund worth $72 billion.
"You're
talking about access to more than $200 billion under their disposal in
case they have to react to something," Mr. Coronado said.
That something could be the ongoing European debt crisis, a deepening recession in the United States - or even a shift in which a new political party takes the helm.
The
P.R.I.'s Enrique Peña Nieto, the former governor of the State of
Mexico, is the presumed front-runner. The leftist Party of the
Democratic Revolution, or P.R.D., will field Andrés Manuel López Obrador
of Tabasco, who in 2006 lost the presidential election to Mr. Calderón.
Mr. Calderón's own National Action Party, or P.A.N., is choosing from
Santiago Creel, a Mexican senator and former minister of the interior;
Josefina Vázquez Mota, a former member of Mexico's Chamber of Deputies;
and Ernesto Cordero, the country's former finance minister.
Ms.
Vázquez Mota, a former campaign manager for Mr. Calderón who is vying
to be the country's first female president, will most likely be named
the party's nominee in February.
Mr.
Schwebel said it is important to Texas businesses that the winner
maintain Mr. Calderón's economic policies and a consistent plan to
combat organized crime, which has contributed to more than 50,000
homicides in Mexico in under six years.
"The
North American economy is 25 percent of the global economy, and we want
that to grow," he said. "The P.R.I. and the P.A.N. and even the P.R.D.
do not want to disrupt that as they try to set up their strategy in
combating the wave of violence."
Eric Olson, a senior associate at the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
in Washington, D.C., said that all of the candidates have vowed, in
varying ways, to rein in the military's role in the drug war and to
instead rely on civilian police forces.
But
it is unclear how quickly that can happen, Mr. Olson said. The
relatively small ranks of the federal police force and the inherent
weaknesses of the local and state police forces - and the government's
limited ability to bolster them with honest officers - could delay the
shift.
"I
think there's just bound to be a transition period, and the question is
how soon that takes place," Mr. Olson said. "My hunch is that it will
be a slow process."
Immigration rates, both legal and illegal, will depend on more than just violence in Mexico, experts said.
Demetrios Papademetriou, the president and co-founder of the Migration Policy Institute,
based in Washington, D.C., said that if the economic policy of a new
administration dramatically improved the quality of life for Mexicans -
by taking on tough monopolies, for example, or providing energy
incentives - more Mexicans might be inspired to stay.
"That
will make the middle class in Mexico perhaps a bit better off;
therefore, they spend less money on basic services," he said. "Then,
presumably, over four or five or seven years, the pressure for
immigration from Mexico will subside further."
He
said that this is especially likely if Mexico's economy continues to
grow at a faster rate than the United States', which he said is only
"sputtering forward."
Mr.
Papademetriou does not think changes in American immigration policy
will significantly hinge on who becomes the next Mexican president. He
said the party that wins would most likely pursue the existing strategy
of trying to protect the economic ties between the United States and
Mexico from immigration trends.
"They
will want to protect the interest of the Mexicans living in the United
States," he said. "Just like the P.A.N. or any other party in Mexico,
the P.R.I. will be trying to make sure that they inoculate the broader
economic relationship from being impacted too much by the migration
situation."
While
Texas business and policy experts keep their eyes on Mexico's
presidential contest, some Mexico City election officials are looking
back at Texas, working overtime to try to increase turnout among Mexican
expatriates living in the United States.
This presidential election is only the second in Mexican history in which expatriates can cast a ballot from abroad. The Federal Electoral Institute, or I.F.E., which has a separate site
encouraging voting from abroad, estimates that the population of
native-born Mexicans living in the United States reached 11.4 million in
2010. Those who are at least 18 are eligible to vote in the country's
elections.
In
2006, the first year Mexico collected ballots from abroad, the I.F.E.
received about 53,000 applications for placement on the foreign voters
list and accepted about 41,000; 33,111 cast ballots.
jaguilar@texastribune.org
By JULIÁN AGUILAR
Published: January 7, 2012
![]()
Andrés Manuel López Obrador: The candidate of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (P.R.D.).
Texas
politicians are paying close attention, too - to whether the trade,
security and energy policies of President Felipe Calderón's successor
will affect illegal immigration or the state's robust trade relationship with Mexico.
Three Texas customs districts, Laredo,El Paso and Houston,
rank among Mexico's top four trading partners. Collectively, they
accounted for roughly $235 billion in trade between Texas and Mexico
from January to September 2011, according to United States Census data
analyzed by WorldCity, which tracks global trade patterns. The figures show an increase over 2010 despite the American recession and unprecedented violence in Mexico because of warring drug cartels.
Gerardo Schwebel,
the executive vice president of International Bank of Commerce's
international division in Laredo, said the future of this booming trade
relationship partly depends on what investors anticipate for the peso.
Though Mr. Schwebel and other analysts speculate that Mexico will not
see a major devaluation similar to what it experienced three
presidential elections ago, when political, social and economic factors
plunged the country into a financial crisis, he warned that its currency
is still volatile.
"The
reason behind that is, the uncertainty of Europe and the U.S. economy
have added pressures to the Mexican peso," Mr. Schwebel said. He added
that the Mexican customer must constantly measure whether to make
payments in dollars, or whether to wait and see if the peso gets weaker
or stronger, depending on what the transaction is.
Major
reforms carried out in Mexico since 1994, the last year the
Institutional Revolutionary Party, or P.R.I., won the presidency, have
prevented the peso from plummeting as it did that year.
"Today
it's a completely different scenario in the sense that Mexico's central
bank has very deep national reserves," said Roberto A. Coronado, an
economist at the El Paso branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
Mr. Coronado said that as of December, Mexico had $140 billion in
foreign exchange reserves, plus a line of credit with the International
Monetary Fund worth $72 billion.
"You're
talking about access to more than $200 billion under their disposal in
case they have to react to something," Mr. Coronado said.
That something could be the ongoing European debt crisis, a deepening recession in the United States - or even a shift in which a new political party takes the helm.
The
P.R.I.'s Enrique Peña Nieto, the former governor of the State of
Mexico, is the presumed front-runner. The leftist Party of the
Democratic Revolution, or P.R.D., will field Andrés Manuel López Obrador
of Tabasco, who in 2006 lost the presidential election to Mr. Calderón.
Mr. Calderón's own National Action Party, or P.A.N., is choosing from
Santiago Creel, a Mexican senator and former minister of the interior;
Josefina Vázquez Mota, a former member of Mexico's Chamber of Deputies;
and Ernesto Cordero, the country's former finance minister.
Ms.
Vázquez Mota, a former campaign manager for Mr. Calderón who is vying
to be the country's first female president, will most likely be named
the party's nominee in February.
Mr.
Schwebel said it is important to Texas businesses that the winner
maintain Mr. Calderón's economic policies and a consistent plan to
combat organized crime, which has contributed to more than 50,000
homicides in Mexico in under six years.
"The
North American economy is 25 percent of the global economy, and we want
that to grow," he said. "The P.R.I. and the P.A.N. and even the P.R.D.
do not want to disrupt that as they try to set up their strategy in
combating the wave of violence."
Eric Olson, a senior associate at the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
in Washington, D.C., said that all of the candidates have vowed, in
varying ways, to rein in the military's role in the drug war and to
instead rely on civilian police forces.
But
it is unclear how quickly that can happen, Mr. Olson said. The
relatively small ranks of the federal police force and the inherent
weaknesses of the local and state police forces - and the government's
limited ability to bolster them with honest officers - could delay the
shift.
"I
think there's just bound to be a transition period, and the question is
how soon that takes place," Mr. Olson said. "My hunch is that it will
be a slow process."
Immigration rates, both legal and illegal, will depend on more than just violence in Mexico, experts said.
Demetrios Papademetriou, the president and co-founder of the Migration Policy Institute,
based in Washington, D.C., said that if the economic policy of a new
administration dramatically improved the quality of life for Mexicans -
by taking on tough monopolies, for example, or providing energy
incentives - more Mexicans might be inspired to stay.
"That
will make the middle class in Mexico perhaps a bit better off;
therefore, they spend less money on basic services," he said. "Then,
presumably, over four or five or seven years, the pressure for
immigration from Mexico will subside further."
He
said that this is especially likely if Mexico's economy continues to
grow at a faster rate than the United States', which he said is only
"sputtering forward."
Mr.
Papademetriou does not think changes in American immigration policy
will significantly hinge on who becomes the next Mexican president. He
said the party that wins would most likely pursue the existing strategy
of trying to protect the economic ties between the United States and
Mexico from immigration trends.
"They
will want to protect the interest of the Mexicans living in the United
States," he said. "Just like the P.A.N. or any other party in Mexico,
the P.R.I. will be trying to make sure that they inoculate the broader
economic relationship from being impacted too much by the migration
situation."
While
Texas business and policy experts keep their eyes on Mexico's
presidential contest, some Mexico City election officials are looking
back at Texas, working overtime to try to increase turnout among Mexican
expatriates living in the United States.
This presidential election is only the second in Mexican history in which expatriates can cast a ballot from abroad. The Federal Electoral Institute, or I.F.E., which has a separate site
encouraging voting from abroad, estimates that the population of
native-born Mexicans living in the United States reached 11.4 million in
2010. Those who are at least 18 are eligible to vote in the country's
elections.
In
2006, the first year Mexico collected ballots from abroad, the I.F.E.
received about 53,000 applications for placement on the foreign voters
list and accepted about 41,000; 33,111 cast ballots.
jaguilar@texastribune.org
Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) January 10, 2012
Rosemary Garrison's annual Spring Mexico yoga retreat is taking place
once again in the beautiful beach and jungle landscape of Sayulita,
Mexico.
Yoga students from all over the U.S. and abroad bring their Vinyasa,
Ashtanga, Bikram, Iyengar and other yoga backgrounds to practice under
the gentle warmth and peaceful serenity of coastal Mexico, leaving
behind the cold Winter months for the Mexico beach. The Spring yoga
retreat is an opportunity to study and practice with a much-loved San
Francisco yoga teacher, as well as to connect with other students from
different practices and backgrounds.
The Mexico yoga retreat in 2012 will be for seven days and seven nights, at the spiritual sanctuary of Haramara Retreat
- an enchanted location nestled within one of the most beautiful
coastlines along the Pacific. Known by many yoga students and retreat
visitors as "a sanctuary for the soul," Haramara provides the luscious
backdrop of beautiful ocean landscapes and a vast, tropical jungle -
providing for the enrichment, healing, nurturing and encouragement of
the yogic spirit.
Retreat amenities include palm-thatch cabanas with large beds with
hand-woven sheets and single, double, triple, and dormitory style rooms.
Three healthy, delicious meals will be served daily, and there will be
opportunities for exploration beyond the retreat perimeter - including
surfing, trail hiking, kayaking, and horseback riding.
Each day of the retreat will include a morning and an evening Vinyasa
Flow yoga class followed by teachings around the purpose, philosophy,
and power of the practice both historically, and within the context of
modern lifestyles. The yoga classes will be preparation for daily
meditation both for those students with a meditation practice, as well
as for those yogis who are interested in beginning meditation.
Instruction will be available for all interested.
Featured in the New York Times Travel Section and Food & Wine Magazine,
Rosemary's yoga retreats are considered some of the most replenishing
and healing weeks of the year by her yoga students, who have traveled
from cities all over the country to attend, including New York, Denver,
Seattle, Los Angeles, and many others.
To learn more or to submit a retreat application, Contact Rosemary Garrison Yoga.
About Rosemary Garrison:
Rosemary's yoga journey began with the Mysore Ashtanga first series
taught by renowned Ashtanga yoga teacher Tim Miller, with whom she has
studied extensively. Years later, further exploration into yogic
movement and practice guided her to Vinyasa Flow yoga classes where she
found the dance of Vinyasa liberating, beautiful, and alive. She then
began practicing with an array of talented teachers within the yoga flow
lineage - Max Strom, Dharma Mittra, and Shiva Rea. After a Yoga
Alliance Certification, a teacher training with David Swenson, and a
myriad of other trainings, she began teaching yoga in 2004 and has
taught yoga full-time ever since. Rosemary is RYT 500 Yoga Alliance
certified.
In addition to leading retreats and teaching her weekly yoga classes, Rosemary teaches private yoga in Los Angeles and San Francisco, as well as corporate yoga for businesses.
The invitation of Prof. Deepak K. Datta of the College of Business
at the University
of Texas
at Arlington, Medical
Tourism Corporation CEO, Mr. Deepak Datta, shared an
insight on “Medical Tourism” with UTA Executive MBA Class, during their
post-dinner session in a December evening class.
(There is no typing error! They both share the same name.)
Mr. Deepak Datta, at the executive MBA program of the University of Texas, talked about globalization
in healthcare industry as related to Medical
Tourism.
The practice of seeking medical treatments outside one’s local healthcare
system dates back to thousands of years, when people traveled to get treatments
for various ailments in mineral water spas. However, technology, more efficient
means of travel, and active involvement of mass media have contributed to a
steady growth in the numbers of patients traveling overseas for surgeries.
Mr. Datta said that medical tourism is a regional
phenomenon, with most medical tourists preferring to visit nearby countries for
their healthcare needs.
While Americans and Canadians mostly head to Mexico and Costa Rica, people from Africa
and the Middle East
prefer to go to India.
Korea
is the medical destination of choice for many people from Japan, while Thailand is the top choice for most
Australians& many countries in Europe.
Price, safety, travel distance, visa rules, local laws and quality of
healthcare are obviously the chief considerations for medical tourists while
deciding their healthcare destination, but some cultural influence is also
noted. While US Hispanics head to Mexico,
the Britons prefer other European countries.
A destination’s reputation for a particular medical service also matters and
some countries are more popular for certain procedures than others.
Surrogacy
in India attracts
many foreigners struggling with infertility issues. Cosmetic surgeries like
*** implants, liposuction and hair
transplant in India
also have many takers because of their low prices. Treatments for heart
problems and orthopedic treatments like knee replacement, hip replacement,
cervical and lumbar
spinal disc replacement in India
are sought by people, who cannot afford them at their native places.
Low cost dental treatments and weight
loss surgery in Mexico
are preferred by Americans and Canadians, who do not want to travel too far for
healthcare. Many Americans prefer to drive down to the border, get their root
canals or dental
implants in US-Mexico
border clinics (which have mushroomed at a remarkable rate over the past
few years) and return home the same day.
Many people also opt to get their dental
implants in Costa Rica.
Besides, they fly to get bariatric and cosmetic surgeries in these Latin
American countries, because not only the prices are low, but also the
treatments are high quality. Realizing the potential of medical tourism
industry, the doctors are prepared to deal with medical tourists and
accordingly arrange for English-speaking staff.
While the official and most commonly used language in Costa Rica is Spanish, it is not
difficult to find a dentist or cosmetic
surgeon in Costa Rica,
who is fluent in English.
Low priced cosmetic
surgery in Thailand
is also a big draw for medical tourists as they not only get the cost advantage
but also get to maintain privacy for their beauty enhancing treatments. Thailand,
however, is preferred more by Australians as the distance is less and flights
are relatively convenient.
Who wants to wait in long lines to see the dentists, when you can get immediate
load dental implants in Thailand
at less than half the price?
According to Mr. Datta, elective procedures like weight
loss surgery, cosmetic surgery, fertility treatments and dental care are the
most common medical services people travel for. This is probably because these
are generally excluded from insurance coverage and a medical tourist is usually
self-paying.
However, hospitals also get many foreign patients who are looking for more
serious treatments like chemo or radiotherapy for cancer, heart valve
repair/replacement, ivf treatments, knee/shoulder/elbow/hip replacement and
other major surgeries because either the doctors at their home are too busy to
quickly give them an appointment and relieve their pain or they are too
expensive that an individual dreads upsetting his yearly budget if he decides
to undergo a particular surgery.
The UTA MBA students got an overview of the medical tourism industry from a
man who has been in the industry for over many years. Mr. Datta
not only shared facts about the current trends in medical tourism, but also
talked about the various factors that have fuelled globalization of healthcare
industry in the past decade.
He said that the unavailability of doctors or particular medical services at
one’s home turf, better quality of care in another country, and local
healthcare services that are beyond one’s financial means are the factors that
drive medical tourism. Privacy issues at home also sometimes cause people to move
out for their medical treatments.
Mr. Datta clearly dispelled the impression that Medical
Tourism is a fast growing phenomenon, referring to a research that indicated
closure of many medical tourism companies in North America.
However, he pointed that there is no reliable data gathering methodology to
validate the number of medical tourists.
People who travel to get medical treatments away from their local healthcare
systems are called medical tourists. Some do it to save money, while others
travel in pursuit of better services abroad, or to maintain their privacy.
Expats, home returning nonresidents, tourists availing emergency medical
services, are also clubbed together as medical tourists. There are also some
spa & wellness travelers, but they do not represent a strict medical
tourist.
Patient numbers of Medical Tourism Co., a Texas-based
medical tourism company run by Mr. Datta, have been growing at
a significant rate since 2008, essentially due to extended network of hospital
and doctors.Mr. Datta has continuously endeavored to join
hands with the finest hospitals in several countries and is quite upbeat about
the growth of the company in near future.
Medical Tourism Co. has networked with reputed hospitals in Mexico, Costa Rica, Belgium, Turkey, Jordan,El Salvador, South Korea, Thailand, and India,
and over the past few years, the company has facilitated out-of-country medical
treatments for over 2000 patients from the West.
The UTA MBA students also got to learn about the challenges faced by the patients
and the hospitals in the globalization of healthcare industry, which include
the absence of anyglobal standard patient outcome data, no clear cut follow-up
regimen, language & cultural differences, safety issues at a medial
destination, long travel, and complex visa laws in some countries.
Mr. Datta shared that patients are sometimes apprehensive
of the quality of care offered in a foreign hospital and they are not certain
about the follow up care since traveling long distances again is difficult.
On the hospitals’ part, many times there is lack of understanding the
market. It is important to promote and provide what a medical traveler is
looking for, and tourism, Mr. Datta says, is always secondary
for these travelers.
Mr. Datta also explained how medical tourism works with
medical insurance companies. He revealed that there have been some efforts in
this direction but none has been very successful.
With the media hype surrounding medical treatments abroad, it is quite
likely that hospitals in the west have started feeling a little threatened by
the whole concept.
However, the vulnerability of American hospitals to medical tourism is not very
convincing as majority of medical tourists travel abroad for elective
procedures that are self-paying.
Had medical travel not been an option, they may have never got the procedure
done in the first place at home.
Mr. Datta also noted that US probably benefits the most
from the medical tourism industry, as thousands of patients from different
parts of the world visit leading American hospitals like MD Anderson Cancer
Center, Jackson Memorial Hospital, Cleveland Clinic,
Mayo Clinic, John
Hopkins, Harvard Medical, and others. Most of these patients are
either wealthy individuals or sponsored by their home governments.
Towards the end of the presentation, Mr. Datta shared in
which direction he sees the industry to be headed, and talked about the future
of the US
medical traveler.
Prof. Deepak
K. Datta(UTA), an award-winning business teacher and researcher,
had invited MTC’s Deepak Datta to share his knowledge about
the ‘Globalization in the Healthcare Industry’ with UTA MBA students.
Prof. Datta teaches in undergraduate, graduate and doctoral programs and
UTA, and has also served as the visiting faculty in several international
programs. He expressed gratitude for Mr. Datta’s presentation in the UTA
session, and said, “Your talk fit in perfectly with class objectives – in fact
it helped reinforce some of the things we had discussed prior to your talk.”
Later, the class felicitated Mr. Datta with UTA mementos.
###
Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2012/1/prweb9062631.htm