BY MARK B. SOLOMON, SENIOR EDITOR
NATIONAL MOTOR FREIGHT
transportationreport
Much ado about nada?
The dispute over Mexican truckers’ access to U.S. markets is
close to resolution. The industry’s response: A collective shrug.
WHAT IF THEY THREW OPEN THE U.S.-MEXICAN BORDER TO ALL QUALIFIED
trucking companies, but no Mexican truckers showed up?
It would indeed be an ironic outcome of a battle that has dragged on for more than 11
years, culminating in March 2009 in a mini-trade war that has cost U.S. exporters billions of
dollars in lost revenue and, according to U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimates, led to the loss
of more than 25,000 American jobs.
Yet it is entirely plausible, according to various experts. For all the publicity surrounding
the March 3 announcement by President Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe
Calderón of a tentative resolution to the cross-border dispute, few expect the status quo to
change for years to come. The agreement would allow carriers on both sides of the border to
operate beyond a 25-mile “commercial zone,” but that doesn’t mean they’ll take advantage of
that freedom. In fact, Mexican truckers will have little, if any, desire to operate deeper into
U.S. commerce than they already do, these experts say.
“The majority of Mexican truckers don’t want any part of it,” says Herb Schmidt, president
and CEO of Con-way Truckload, the truckload unit of Con-way Inc. Schmidt estimates that only
5 percent of the 80 Mexican truckers that have cross-border interline relationships with Con-way
Truckload have even considered serving the U.S. market beyond the commercial zone.
“There’s less interest on the part of Mexican truckers than many people think,” adds Derek
J. Leathers, chief operating officer of truckload giant Werner Enterprises, which generates
about 10 percent of its annual revenue from Mexican operations. Before joining Werner,
Leathers spent four years running the Mexican division of truckload and logistics
giant Schneider National Inc.
