In February 2007, Mexican finance minister Agustín Carstens made
a surprise announcement that his country could become a fully
developed nation within 20 years. He compared the nation’s
position with that of Spain and Ireland in the 1980s: “There are
countries that in 20 years have carried out significant changes
in their productive structure, per-capita income, in the well-
being of the population, and I believe that Mexico is in a
position to do something similar,” he stated. Improved
competitiveness, a stronger inflation and growth record, and a
rush of investor optimism all confirm that the nation is resting
on a much firmer economic platform than it was during the 1990s,
so there is some justification for this statement. Experts have
noted that much of this economic recovery can be traced to
successive governments’ patient construction of strong
regulatory and technical foundations. Close attention to
production and energy inefficiencies acted as one of the many
key building blocks. Through increasingly s