/ Modified jul 8, 2019 10:43 a.m.

Mexico extends $100M reforesting program to Honduras to stem migration

The country had already announced $30 million for a tree-planting program in El Salvador.

Mexican Flag The flag of Mexico.
Pixabay

MEXICO CITY — Mexico said Monday it will extend a reforestation program to Honduras, and increase funding to $100 million to create jobs in Central America and stem migration from the region.

Mexico had already announced a $30 million tree-planting program for El Salvador and that money is presumably part of the $100 million total effort.

Marcelo Ebrard, Mexico's foreign relations secretary, said Honduras' president is expected to finalize details in a visit to Mexico this month.

Ebrard said creating jobs will do more to stop the flow of migrants than border enforcement measures.

It is unclear whether Guatemala will also join Mexico's reforestation program.

A similar plan to plant fruit and lumber trees is already being implemented in southern Mexico; it is one of the pet projects of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

Ebrard also said that 327 Central American migrants awaiting US asylum hearings have found jobs in northern Mexico, and that companies had offered a total of 3,700 positions.

Under the Remain in Mexico program, 16,714 Central Americans who applied for asylum in the United States have been returned to Mexico so far this year to await the resolution of their U.S. cases.

Critics claim the program, also known as the Migrant Protection Protocols, leaves migrants in Mexican border cities with no income or housing.

Ebrard said Mexican officials had overcome legal hurdles to allow migrants to work while they are waiting. Many of the jobs are at border assembly plants known as maquiladoras.

Ebrard said Mexico had also arranged with 16 border shelters to house at least some of the waiting migrants.

However, some asylum applicants appear to have given up.

In early July, 66 Central Americans who had been returned to the border city of Ciudad Juarez to await the outcome of their U.S. asylum claims were bused back to their home countries.

By posting comments, you agree to our
AZPM encourages comments, but comments that contain profanity, unrelated information, threats, libel, defamatory statements, obscenities, pornography or that violate the law are not allowed. Comments that promote commercial products or services are not allowed. Comments in violation of this policy will be removed. Continued posting of comments that violate this policy will result in the commenter being banned from the site.

By submitting your comments, you hereby give AZPM the right to post your comments and potentially use them in any other form of media operated by this institution.
AZPM is a service of the University of Arizona and our broadcast stations are licensed to the Arizona Board of Regents who hold the trademarks for Arizona Public Media and AZPM. We respectfully acknowledge the University of Arizona is on the land and territories of Indigenous peoples.
The University of Arizona