Development and Application of a Methodology to Identify Mexico-U.S. Cross-Border Trade with Potential for Diversion to Short-Sea-Shipping Operations

U.S.-Mexico cross-border trade has been growing since the inception of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and although these freight movements have expanded because of the ability of land-base transportation networks to meet shipper’s needs, there is a growing concern among stakeholders that these networks are rapidly approaching, and sometimes exceeding, the capacities they were designed for. A possible solution to these problems might be the diversion of a portion of the trade that is currently being moved by land between Mexico and the U.S. into a short sea shipping operation. From the available sources of cross-border flow information that were analyzed, the Border Trade Statistics Transborder Surface Trade Data (BTS) information is the most updated and relevant source for this research. This dataset provides commodity information with a sufficient level of detail for this analysis. However, the Mexican state of origin is not reported in this or any other dataset. The methodology developed in this research provides a proxy of Mexican exports to the U.S. at the Mexican state level. With this complete set of commodity flows at the state level in Mexico and the U.S., a process is developed to produce results at sufficient level of desegregation that could serve as a first step in identifying commodity volumes that have potential of being diverted to short sea shipping. Further research is needed to identify specific supply chains that have characteristics and volumes that make them candidates to divert from land cross border to short sea shipping between Mexico and the U.S.

• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • Villa, Juan Carlos
  • Solari, Jose Manuel
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 86th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2007-1-21 to 2007-1-25
• Date: 2007

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: CD-ROM
• Features: Maps; References; Tables;
• Monograph Title: TRB 86th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers CD-ROM

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Coastwise shipping; Commodity flow; International borders; International trade; Methodology; Ship lines; Shipping; Short sea shipping
• Identifier Terms: North American Free Trade Agreement
• Geographic Terms: Mexico; United States-Mexico Border
• Subject Areas: Administration and Management; Highways; Marine Transportation; Planning and Forecasting; Security and Emergencies; I10: Economics and Administration; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01045034
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 07-2861
• Files: TRIS, TRB
• Created Date: Mar 30 2007 7:00AM