By Katie Davis A lejandro Ramirez, Chief ExecutiveOfficer of the world’s fourth-largest cinema chain, Cine- polis de Mexico SA which has 3,200 movie screens in Mexico, with 1,700 more between Latin America, the U.S., Spain and India, says the company buys about $10 million USD a year of popcorn kernels from American farmers. In addition, buys another $40 million USD on other products from the U.S. such as screens, projectors, and $6.5 million of Wisconsin cheese. Cinepolis has invested about $140 million in the U.S. market however; Mexico remains by far its biggest presence. In saying that, about 90 percent of the movies shown in Mexico’s Cinepolis’ theaters come from the U.S., “We’re one of Hollywood’s big customers,” Ramirez said. “We import all of our corn for movie theaters from the U.S. thanks to the fact that there’s free trade,” Ramirez said. “If that wasn’t the case -- if we go to pre-NAFTA tariff levels -- then it would be cheaper to bring it from Argentina.” Ramirez said in a proactive strategy that his company already studied sourcing the corn from Argentina after Trump’s victory and talks about re- negotiating NAFTA pushed the peso to record lows against the U.S. dollar. Ramirez says for now they will continue to buy from U.S. farmers however, further declines in the peso or even a small tax increase would force them to start sourcing their kernels from Argentina. Most of the talk about NAFTA has been focused on the auto industry and automakers however, Ramirez who heads a business chamber including the nation’s biggest multina- tional companies, knows the impact that sanctions on other U.S. exports that are unrelated to auto manufacturing could become impacted and he and his group are working with its business partners in the U.S. to educate politicians on the value of economic integration. While Cinepolis’ purchases are just a kernel in an over flowing bucket of popcorn, as U.S. exports more than $2 billion in corn to Mexico annually, so if other businesses have to follow Cinepolis’ path to cheaper corn from Argentina, this could have a huge impact on U.S. farmers. Ramirez doubts many American farmers know when their produce ends up in Mexico and the impacts that any change in NAFTA could have on their industry, but he added getting this message out is now the mission of his group. Ramirez wants the farming industry as well as other industries to understand that free trade agreement has been critical for competitiveness of the North American region as a whole and we should not lose sight of that.
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MARCH 2017 • SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE
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