Link to Article: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/5/7/trees-for-visas-mexico-wants-jobs-programme-us-offers-relief
The Mexican President has pitched a tree-planting jobs program in Central America that he said should lead to work visas in the United States, in immigration talks on Friday with US Vice President Kamala Harris. At the start of the call, Harris said the United States and Mexico must fight violence and corruption together, along with the root causes of migration in Central America. Harris addressed the crisis on the US-Mexico border, which she hoped to alleviate by providing relief to the Northern Triangle. the Mexican president noted “we have a common border that is over 3000km [1864 miles] long and we need to understand one another and avoid fighting”. Harris has said she will visit Mexico and Guatemala on June 7 and 8 to further discuss the program. It will be her first foreign trip as vice president.
This is highly important because the United States and Mexico are trying to work together to solve issues that have been going on for decades. I do not know how far these talks will go because it has taken so long to go anything worked out in the first place. But both countries do seem like they both want change so that is a step in the right direction. I do like the idea of planting trees in exchange for working visas and I think that deal will easily pass. But fixing the corruption and the border is a bigger issue that will be a lot harder to solve.
This is another example of what we have talked about in international relations because two countries are working together to solve their issues. We have always talked about how every country does what they do for a reason. These talks will hopefully help both countries economically and security wise. The article also mentioned how Mexico is the United States biggest trading partner, and them being on good terms and working with each other will make their trade a whole lot easier. In order to work out the current issues at hand both countries are going to have to experience change, hopefully they are able to work something out.