Mexico

• high, rugged mountains;
• low coastal plains;
• high plateaus;
• desert

agricultural land:

54.9%;

• arable land 11.8%;
• permanent crops 1.4%;
• permanent pasture 41.7%

forest:

33.3%

other:

11.8% (2011 est.)

• most of the population is found in the middle of the country between the states of Jalisco and Veracruz;
• approximately a quarter of the population lives in and around Mexico City

• scarcity of hazardous waste disposal facilities;
• rural to urban migration;
• natural freshwater resources scarce and polluted in north, inaccessible and poor quality in center and extreme southeast;
• raw sewage and industrial effluents polluting rivers in urban areas;
• deforestation;
• widespread erosion;
• desertification;
• deteriorating agricultural lands;
• serious air and water pollution in the national capital and urban centers along US-Mexico border;
• land subsidence in Valley of Mexico caused by groundwater depletion

note: the government considers the lack of clean water and deforestation national security issues

party to:

Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping, Marine Life Conservation, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands, Whaling

signed, but not ratified:

none of the selected agreements

noun:

Mexican(s)

adjective:

Mexican

• most of the population is found in the middle of the country between the states of Jalisco and Veracruz;
• approximately a quarter of the population lives in and around Mexico City

at birth:

1.05 male(s)/female

0-14 years:

1.05 male(s)/female

15-24 years:

1.03 male(s)/female

25-54 years:

0.93 male(s)/female

55-64 years:

0.85 male(s)/female

65 years and over:

0.82 male(s)/female

total population:

0.96 male(s)/female (2016 est.)

conventional long form:

United Mexican States

conventional short form:

Mexico

local long form:

Estados Unidos Mexicanos

local short form:

Mexico

etymology:

named after the Mexica, the largest and most powerful branch of the Aztecs; the meaning of the name is uncertain

name:

Mexico City (Ciudad de Mexico)

geographic coordinates:

19 26 N, 99 08 W

time difference:

UTC-6 (1 hour behind Washington, DC, during Standard Time)

daylight saving time:

+1hr, begins first Sunday in April; ends last Sunday in October

note: Mexico has four time zones

• 31 states (estados, singular - estado) and 1 city* (ciudad);
• Aguascalientes, Baja California, Baja California Sur, Campeche, Chiapas, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Colima, Cuidad de Mexico*, Durango, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Hidalgo, Jalisco, Mexico, Michoacan, Morelos, Nayarit, Nuevo Leon, Oaxaca, Puebla, Queretaro, Quintana Roo, San Luis Potosi, Sinaloa, Sonora, Tabasco, Tamaulipas, Tlaxcala, Veracruz, Yucatan, Zacatecas

• several previous;
• latest approved 5 February 1917;
• amended many times, last in 2015 (2016)

citizenship by birth:

yes

citizenship by descent:

yes

dual citizenship recognized:

not specified

residency requirement for naturalization:

5 years

highest court(s):

Supreme Court of Justice or Suprema Corte de Justicia de la Nacion (consists of the chief justice and 11 justices and organized into civil, criminal, administrative, and labor panels) and the Electoral Tribunal of the Federal Judiciary (organized into the superior court, with 7 judges including the court president and 5 regional courts, each with 3 judges)

judge selection and term of office:

• Supreme Court justices nominated by the president of the republic and approved by two-thirds vote of the members present in the Senate;
• justices serve for life;
• Electoral Tribunal superior and regional court judges nominated by the Supreme Court and elected by two-thirds vote of members present in the Senate;
• superior court president elected from among its members to hold office for a 4-year term;
• other judges of the superior and regional courts serve staggered, 9-year terms

subordinate courts:

federal level includes circuit, collegiate, and unitary courts; state and district level courts

• Citizen's Movement (Movimiento Ciudadano) or MC [Dante DELGADO Rannaoro]
• Institutional Revolutionary Party (Partido Revolucionario Institucional) or PRI [Enrique OCHOA Reza]
• Labor Party (Partido del Trabajo) or PT [Alberto ANAYA Gutierrez]
• Mexican Green Ecological Party (Partido Verde Ecologista de Mexico) or PVEM [Carlos Alberto PUENTE Salas]
• Movement for National Regeneration (Movimiento Regeneracion Nacional) or MORENA [Andres Manuel LOPEZ Obrador]
• National Action Party (Partido Accion Nacional) or PAN (vacant)
• New Alliance Party (Partido Nueva Alianza) or PNA/PANAL [Luis CASTRO Obregon]
• Party of the Democratic Revolution (Partido de la Revolucion Democratica) or PRD [Alejandra BARRALES Magdaleno]
• Social Encounter Party (Partido Encuentro Social) or PES [Hugo Eric FLORES Cervantes]

• Businessmen's Coordinating Council or CCE
• Confederation of Employers of the Mexican Republic or COPARMEX
• Confederation of Industrial Chambers or CONCAMIN
• Confederation of Mexican Workers or CTM
• Confederation of National Chambers of Commerce or CONCANACO
• Coordinator for Foreign Trade Business Organizations or COECE
• Federation of Unions Providing Goods and Services or FESEBES
• National Chamber of Transformation Industries or CANACINTRA
• National Confederation of Popular Organizations or CNOP
• National Coordinator for Education Workers or CNTE
• National Peasant Confederation or CNC
• National Small Business Chamber or CANACOPE
• National Syndicate of Education Workers or SNTE
• National Union of Workers or UNT
• Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca or APPO
• Roman Catholic Church

chief of mission:

Ambassador Roberta JACOBSON (since 20 June 2016)

embassy:

Paseo de la Reforma 305, Colonia Cuauhtemoc, 06500 Mexico, Distrito Federal

mailing address:

P. O. Box 9000, Brownsville, TX 78520-9000

telephone:

(01-55) 5080-2000

FAX:

(01-55) 5080-2005

consulate(s) general:

Ciudad Juarez, Guadalajara, Hermosillo, Matamoros, Merida, Monterrey, Nogales, Nuevo Laredo, Tijuana

• three equal vertical bands of green (hoist side), white, and red;
• Mexico's coat of arms (an eagle with a snake in its beak perched on a cactus) is centered in the white band;
• green signifies hope, joy, and love;
• white represents peace and honesty;
• red stands for hardiness, bravery, strength, and valor;
• the coat of arms is derived from a legend that the wandering Aztec people were to settle at a location where they would see an eagle on a cactus eating a snake;
• the city they founded, Tenochtitlan, is now Mexico City

note: similar to the flag of Italy, which is shorter, uses lighter shades of red and green, and does not display anything in its white band

• corn, wheat, soybeans, rice, beans, cotton, coffee, fruit, tomatoes;
• beef, poultry, dairy products;
• wood products

agriculture:

13.4%

industry:

24.1%

services:

61.9% (2011)

lowest 10%:

2%

highest 10%:

40% (2014)

general assessment:

• adequate telephone service for business and government;
• improving quality and increasing mobile cellular availability, with mobile subscribers far outnumbering fixed-line subscribers;
• domestic satellite system with 120 earth stations;
• extensive microwave radio relay network;
• considerable use of fiber-optic cable and coaxial cable

domestic:

• competition has spurred the mobile-cellular market;
• fixed-line teledensity exceeds 15 per 100 persons;
• mobile-cellular teledensity is about 90 per 100 persons

international:

• country code - 52;
• Columbus-2 fiber-optic submarine cable with access to the US, Virgin Islands, Canary Islands, Spain, and Italy;
• the Americas Region Caribbean Ring System (ARCOS-1) and the MAYA-1 submarine cable system together provide access to Central America, parts of South America and the Caribbean, and the US;
• satellite earth stations - 120 (32 Intelsat, 2 Solidaridad (giving Mexico improved access to South America, Central America, and much of the US as well as enhancing domestic communications), 1 Panamsat, numerous Inmarsat mobile earth stations);
• linked to Central American Microwave System of trunk connections (2016)

• many TV stations and more than 1,400 radio stations with most privately owned;
• the Televisa group once had a virtual monopoly in TV broadcasting, but new broadcasting groups and foreign satellite and cable operators are now available (2012)

number of registered air carriers:

21; inventory of registered aircraft operated by air carriers: 357

annual passenger traffic on registered air carriers:

45,560,063

annual freight traffic on registered air carriers:

713,985,467 mt-km (2015)

• gas 18,074 km;
• liquid petroleum 2,102 km;
• oil 8,775 km;
• oil/gas/water 369 km;
• refined products 7,565 km;
• water 123 km (2013)

total:

15,389 km

standard gauge:

15,389 km 1.435-m gauge (27 km electrified) (2014)

country comparison to the world: 18

total:

377,660 km

paved:

137,544 km (includes 7,176 km of expressways)

unpaved:

240,116 km (2012)

country comparison to the world: 20

total:

622

by type:

bulk carrier 5, general cargo 9, oil tanker 32, other 576 (2017)

country comparison to the world: 33

major seaport(s):

Altamira, Coatzacoalcos, Lazaro Cardenas, Manzanillo, Veracruz

container port(s) (TEUs):

Manzanillo (1,992,176), Lazaro Cardenas (1,242,777) (2012)

oil terminal(s):

Cayo Arcas terminal, Dos Bocas terminal

LNG terminal(s) (import):

Altamira, Ensenada

cruise port(s):

Cancun, Cozumel, Ensenada

• Secretariat of National Defense (Secretaria de Defensa Nacional, Sedena): Army (Ejercito), Mexican Air Force (Fuerza Aerea Mexicana, FAM);
• Secretariat of the Navy (Secretaria de Marina, Semar): Mexican Navy (Armada de Mexico (ARM); includes Naval Air Force (FAN), Mexican Naval Infantry Corps (Cuerpo de Infanteria de Marina, Mexmar or CIM)) (2013)

• 18 years of age for compulsory military service, conscript service obligation is 12 months;
• 16 years of age with consent for voluntary enlistment;
• conscripts serve only in the Army;
• Navy and Air Force service is all voluntary;
• women are eligible for voluntary military service;
• cadets enrolled in military schools from the age of 15 are considered members of the armed forces (2012)

• abundant rainfall in recent years along much of the Mexico-US border region has ameliorated periodically strained water-sharing arrangements;
• the US has intensified security measures to monitor and control legal and illegal personnel, transport, and commodities across its border with Mexico;
• Mexico must deal with thousands of impoverished Guatemalans and other Central Americans who cross the porous border looking for work in Mexico and the US;
• Belize and Mexico are working to solve minor border demarcation discrepancies arising from inaccuracies in the 1898 border treaty

IDPs:

311,000 (government's quashing of Zapatista uprising in 1994 in eastern Chiapas Region; drug cartel violence and government's military response since 2007; violence between and within indigenous groups) (2016)

stateless persons:

13 (2016)

• major drug-producing and transit nation;
• Mexico is estimated to be the world's third largest producer of opium with poppy cultivation in 2015 estimated to be 28,000 hectares yielding a potential production of 475 metric tons of raw opium;
• government conducts the largest independent illicit-crop eradication program in the world;
• continues as the primary transshipment country for US-bound cocaine from South America, with an estimated 95% of annual cocaine movements toward the US stopping in Mexico;
• major drug syndicates control the majority of drug trafficking throughout the country;
• producer and distributor of ecstasy;
• significant money-laundering center;
• major supplier of heroin and largest foreign supplier of marijuana and methamphetamine to the US market