Plan Puebla Panama

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Championed by Mexican President Vicente Fox, the Plan Puebla Panamá ("Puebla Panama Plan") is a multi-billion dollar development plan in progress that would link the nine southern states of Mexico (Puebla and points south) with all of Central America into a colossal free trade zone. The Inter-American Development Bank is overseeing the PPP.

1 Goals
2 Criticism
3 Related
4 External links

[edit] Goals

Goals of the Plan Puebla Panamá include:

improve transportation links
promote tourism and trade
promote education and environmental protection
ease travel restrictions between countries
connect power, telephone, and gas grids – eventually to the US and Canada.

[edit] Criticism

Much criticism of Plan Puebla Panamá is related to criticism of CAFTA. Critics argue that, driven by corporate intersts, corporations would pit desperate workers in Central America against workers in the United States. Several Mexican governors are formulating rival plans.

In addition, critics argue that Plan Puebla Panamá is destroying fragile rain forests and displacing Indigenous peoples who have little voice in the development effort.

[edit] Related

The Trans-Texas Corridor can be viewed as a U.S. counterpart to Plan Puebla Panamá transportation, extending from the US-Mexican border through the entire United States along I-69 and into Canada via Port Huron in Michigan.

By breaking down trade barriers, Central American Free Trade Agreement is a crucial component in Plan Puebla Panama, and the North American Free Trade Agreement can be viewed as a precursor.

Similarly, as the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas can be thought of as an extension of CAFTA, so also can further integration via connectivity to the Initiative for the Integration of South American Infastructure be thought of as a follow on or expansion to the Plan Puebla Panamá and Trans-Texas Corridor initiatives, linking those roadways and reducing barriers to the flow of people and goods throughout much of North and South America.