| MEXICO CITY (Dow Jones)--Talks between Mexico's powerful
sugar mill industry and leaders of the country's equally powerful unions,
representing more than 48,000 striking workers, broke down Thursday,
official said.
As the strike entered its 3rd week, no progress had been achieved and
The Chamber was calling on authorities to declare the strike
illegal.
"The talks broke completely down after today's session with the
unions and the strike continues," Guillermo Beltran, the Chamber's
director general, told Dow Jones Newswires.
Beltran said the Chamber expects that authorities will declare the
strike illegal early next week, and also said the demands of the unions
were "completely irrational" and against a declaration signed by
both parties last September.
"The Unions are asking for salary rises of 25% and a raise in
other benefits of at least 20%, which is totally irrational. We are
willing to offer some salary rise, but not at those levels," said
Beltran.
He said the Chamber was offering, in accordance with Mexican labor
laws, a salary rise based on annual inflation, which currently stands
between 8% and 9%. He said the Chamber would meet with the Labor Ministry
next Monday, but no new date for talks with the unions have been set so
far.
As of Nov. 18, only eight mills had started harvesting and processing
the new 2000/01 cane crop. Only 10 out of Mexico's total of 59 mills in
operation this harvest cycle remain unaffected by the strike.
The harvest traditionally starts in earnest by mid-December, and mill
owners fear that if the strike continues much longer, it can hurt the
repair and rehabilitation work on mills. The work is needed ahead of the
main harvest, and hence can cause serious delay to the physical harvesting
process.
More than 48,000 Mexican sugar workers went on strike Nov. 16 to
protest what they claim is a lack of enforcement for a September agreement
on salary increases and pension funds reached with mill owners.
Mexico's powerful sugar unions frequently strike, both during the
physical harvest from mid-November through July and in between crops. |