Borderlands is a weekly rundown of developments in the world of United States-Mexico cross-border trucking and trade. This week: Truck driver salaries in Mexico averaging $423 a month in 2024; Horizon Auto Logistics opens office in Veracruz, Mexico; LG Electronics opens $60M plant in Central Mexico; and Texas bridge project receives $80 million in federal funding.
Wages in Mexico’s professional cargo trucking industry averaged $423 a month during the second quarter of 2024, according to recent statistics from Data Mexico and the Ministry of Economy.
As of the second quarter, the monthly average comes out to $5,076 annually and was an increase of 8.4% from the same period in 2023, when truck driver wages averaged $390 a month.
Mexico’s trucking industry employed 1.18 million people during the second quarter, a 1.7% increase compared to the same year-ago period.
The average age of truck drivers during the quarter was 41 years old. Men make up more than 98% of drivers in the country.
Women, who make up about 1.29% of truck drivers in the country, earned an average salary of $260 a month during the second quarter.
In comparison, recent data from the American Trucking Associations (ATA) found that the average U.S. truck driver made $76,420 in 2023 – a 10% increase over the previous two years.
Salaries across Mexico’s trucking industry varied widely by location, the type of cargo truck or van driven, the size of the company and the industry segment they were employed in.
The highest average salaries for drivers were seen in construction material hauling ($876 a month), mining services ($845 a month), and retail goods ($645 a month).
The industry with the highest concentration of truck drivers included the automotive industry (62,400), food and beverage (60,500) and raw materials (57,500).
The states with the highest number of professional truckers during the second quarter of 2024 were the State of Mexico (172,000), Nuevo Leon (105,000) and Jalisco (102,000).
The truck industry in Mexico accounts for 3.5% of the country’s gross domestic product, according to Data Mexico.
During the recent North American Transportation Forum webinar on trade agreements, nearshoring and trucking, ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said trucking is an important link in the cross-border supply chain between the U.S. and Mexico.
The webinar was hosted by the International Road Union, a global trucking chamber of commerce based in Geneva, Switzerland.
“The data on U.S. inbound trucks highlights the nearshoring that is going on,” Costello said in a news release. “In the early days of the North American Free Trade Agreement, 60% or more of inbound trucks were coming from Canada. Now over the last five years, we have roughly 30% more trucks coming in from Mexico than Canada.”
As of Oct. 4, cargo volumes moving from Mexico to the U.S. were 17% lower than the same period in 2023, according to the SONAR Northbound Mexico Truckload Volume Index (MEXVOL.MEXUSA).
Horizon Auto Logistics opens office in Veracruz, Mexico
Miami-based Horizon Auto Logistics recently opened an office in the Mexican port city of Veracruz, along the Gulf of Mexico.
Company officials said the new location is part of its strategy to optimize the vehicle supply chain in Mexico.
Horizon Auto Logistics is a marine terminal and logistics operator providing a variety of services in the vehicle transportation industry.
“This building is ideally located and we have further capacity to grow,” Carlos Renteral, vice president and head of Mexico at Horizon said in a news release: “Veracruz is our main operational site and the largest automotive port in Mexico, in fact it’s amongst the largest automotive ports globally.”
Horizon Auto handles more than 200,000 vehicle shipments annually. The company has nine facilities and offices around the world.
Texas bridge project receives $80 million in federal funding
The federal government has awarded $80 million for a planned 1.8-mile bridge that will connect Texas State Highway 170 and Intermodal Parkway in Haslet, Texas.
The North Central Texas Council of Governments was awarded the grant on Oct. 21, according to the Fort Worth Star Telegram.
The Haslet parkway is about 18-miles north of downtown Fort Worth. The bridge aims to allow freight traffic to travel more efficiently between BNSF’s intermodal hub and the nearby logistics warehouses at AllianceTexas.
LG Electronics opens $60M plant in Central Mexico
LG Electronics recently opened a plant in the Mexican city of Ramos Arizpe, creating 400 jobs.
The $60.5 million facility will produce parts for the automotive sector, such as automotive audio components, as well as video and navigation system components.
Ramos Arizpe is located near Monterrey, Mexico, about 180 miles from the border city of Laredo, Texas.
Ana Carolina Cano, LG’s director of human resources at the Ramos Arizpe plant, said the factory is part of the company’s vehicle component solutions division.
“We are committed to driving better future mobility. Our vision is to become the most preferred and iconic Tier 1 supplier in the mobility market, creating the most innovative and immersive in-cabin experience for both our OEM customers and drivers,” Cano said in a statement.
LG Electronics is a division of Seoul, South Korea-based LG Corp.
