Trade on the U.S.-Mexican Border
LOU WATERS, CNN ANCHOR: All week here on "CNN live today," we've been looking at the rapidly changing way of life along the U.S.- Mexican border. Today, we'll talk about trade. Think NAFTA hasn't made much difference? Then you haven't seen all the trucks. CNN, in conjunction with "Time" magazine, takes you to the new frontier, "la nueva frontera." Ed Lavandera reports from Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico.</s>ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is afternoon rush hour border-style, a slow-moving swarm of people carrying their daily necessities across the Rio Grande. But these crowds represent only a fraction of the business crossing the border.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is our first trailer that's going to leave tonight.</s>LAVANDERA: An average of 650 trucks pull out of this Consolidated Freightways warehouse every day.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We move everything from food items to household goods to toys, just about everything.</s>LAVANDERA: Those goods are headed to every corner of the United States.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That thing has got to get out of here in about two hours.</s>LAVANDERA: Consolidated Freightways symbolizes what's happening in Laredo, an explosion of business born of international trade.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As you look around at the diversity, we have the retail and the shipping and the banking. This is like a little Hong Kong.</s>LAVANDERA (on camera): About 40 percent of the ground trade that makes its way between the U.S. and Mexico every year comes through Laredo. This isn't anything new. People have been crisscrossing goods here for years. But what is new is that since NAFTA has taken effect, this border town has seen unprecedented prosperity.</s>FRANK VIDA, CUSTOM BROKERAGE BUSINESS OWNER: What you see here will not be here within in 24 hours.</s>LAVANDERA (voice-over): Frank Vida's Customs brokerage business has outgrown his warehouse. He needs another 70,000 square feet to hold all these boat engines.</s>VIDA: Like a goldfish in a pond, you can only grow as large as the pond is. And this warehouse is our pond, so we have to go to a bigger pond.</s>LAVANDERA: There are dozens of business like Vida's in Laredo. They need more space because demand is relentless.</s>JOHN ADAMS, LAREDO DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION: Trade is the hallmark of Laredo. Either by the grace of God or by just the luck of geography, the fact of the matter is that Laredo is the number one inland port on the southern border.</s>LAVANDERA: That means about 10,000 truckloads cross the border every day, about 60 percent heading north. That's created a new set of problems. Lines of trucks are backed up at the border all day. Customs agents can only inspect a handful of the trucks that come across. The long waits are a major problem for Hector Bolanos, a Mexico Customs broker whose family has been working this border town since 1928. Under trade regulations, he faces more red tape than his U.S. counterparts.</s>HECTOR BOLANOS, MEXICAN BUSINESS OWNER: You have more paperwork because you have more requirements from the Mexican government in order to protect some national industries in Mexico.</s>LAVANDERA: Each box of this shipment of oil filters must be opened, inspected, and a sticker applied.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where are you headed off to?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stillwater, Oklahoma.</s>LAVANDERA: Some here say you can measure the strength of the economy by the number of trucks on the move. More trucks than ever are carving a path out of this south Texas town. Ed Lavandera, CNN, Laredo, Texas.