MOSCOW (MRC) -- Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said the 2021 budget would call for spending on priority infrastructure, including refineries and oil production, and would not raise taxes, reported Reuters.
The Finance Ministry is due to present the budget next Tuesday, with the government facing scrutiny over an economy that has been battered by the coronavirus pandemic.
Gross domestic product could shrink almost 13% this year, the central bank has warned.
Asked during his daily news conference if the new budget would include a plan to reactivate the economy based on infrastructure projects, he listed a variety of works slated for public spending, including refineries, oil production and electric power.
Financing will also be allocated for highways and roads, the completion of a new international airport for Mexico City, and construction on the “Mayan Train” tourist railway on the Yucatan Peninsula.
The projects will include the private sector, “but without putting the country into debt,” the president said.
Lopez Obrador said he did not agree with a proposal by lawmakers from his own Morena party to increase taxes on products such as junk food.
“You can’t traffic in the health of the people,” he said, adding he preferred government campaigns promoting nutrition and exercise.
Lopez Obrador has said previously there will be no tax increases before 2021.
Mexican Finance Minister Arturo Herrera, in a television interview on Wednesday, backed up the president’s vow not to increase taxes.
“Today, companies have little money, families have little money. It’s not the moment to think of that,” Herrera said.
As MRC informed earlier, Mexico's oil giant Pemex is advancing a refinery rehabilitation program that will enable it to process 1.2 million b/d of crude oil by the end of 2020 and evaluating a reconfiguration of its petrochemical facility at Cangrejera, Mexico, into what would be its eighth refinery.
We also remind that in 2016, Pemex shut its steam cracker at its Cangrejera complex for maintenance on February 15. The cracker was idle for about 14 days. The conducted repairs at the cracker were a part of planned maintenance.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's DataScope report, PE imports to Russia dropped in January-June 2020 by 7% year on year to 328,000 tonnes. High density polyethylene (HDPE) accounted for the main decrease in imports. At the same time, PP imports into Russia rose in the first six months of 2020 by 21% year on year to 105,300 tonnes. Propylene homopolymer (homopolymer PP) accounted for the main increase in imports.
MRC