The Protein Sovereignty Index

Country assessment

Mexico

We assess Mexico as Dependent (47.4). It is a large and competent protein producer, covering roughly three-quarters of the meat it eats, effectively all of its eggs and about 70 per cent of its milk, and supplying 100.3 grams of protein per person per day against a world average of 92.5 grams.[1][7]

The binding constraint is that this output is manufactured from inputs bought almost entirely from one country: over 99 per cent of Mexico's 26.5 million tonnes of corn imports and of its soybean meal imports originate in the United States, which on 1 July 2026 declined to renew USMCA in its current form.[1][4][21]

Access and affordability is Mexico's strongest pillar, carried by a low undernourishment rate and a falling unaffordability share, but volatile domestic food prices and a reduced, if still privileged, IMF crisis backstop keep the wider picture well short of resilient.

The protein system

Mexico feeds 130.9 million people on a diet whose protein is unusually balanced, at 57.6 grams of animal protein and 42.7 grams of plant protein per person per day in 2023.[8][18] Meat supply is 78.2 kilograms per person a year, milk 122 kilograms and fish 13.6 kilograms, the last well below the world average of 19.9 kilograms.[9][10][11] Beneath the animal protein sits a maize-and-bean floor that has not moved in five centuries: urban tortilla consumption runs at 56.7 kilograms per person a year on CONEVAL survey data, and bean production reached 1.2 million tonnes in 2025, which the government characterises as self-sufficiency.[1][24]

The livestock system is dominated by monogastrics. Chicken production is forecast at 4.24 million tonnes in 2026 against consumption of 5.34 million tonnes, so imports supply nearly 20 per cent of poultry demand.[3][6] Pork production of 1.41 million tonnes covers only 43 per cent of the 2.90 million tonnes consumed.[2] Beef is the exception, with 2026 production of 2.3 million tonnes level with consumption, though this reflects a trade accident rather than herd growth.[2] Milk production of 13.86 million tonnes in 2025 meets around 70 per cent of demand and is forecast at 14.27 million tonnes in 2026, while Mexico produces roughly a tenth of the skimmed milk powder it consumes.[5][25][30] Eggs are the quiet strength, with 2.8 million tonnes produced in 2018 at 22.98 kilograms per person, among the world's highest per-capita consumption.[4][27] Fisheries land 1.92 million tonnes from capture and 274,000 tonnes from aquaculture.[12][13]

The chain that makes this work is short, dense and singular. Compound feed production reached 41.8 million tonnes in 2025, fifth largest in the world, with broilers and layers taking 19.8 million tonnes and swine 7.2 million.[1] Corn is more than half of that feed, and about 25 million tonnes of the 51.5 million tonnes of corn consumed goes to livestock.[1] Effectively all of the yellow corn arrives on rail from the United States, alongside 2.6 million tonnes of soybean meal, 6.7 million tonnes of soybeans and 2.3 million tonnes of distillers dried grains.[1][4]

Durable domestic capacity: 54

Quantitative score 58, adjusted down 4 points

Mexico's productive base is real, industrial and large. Integrated operations of more than 100,000 birds account for over 75 per cent of chicken output, and 61 per cent of all compound feed comes from integrated firms.[3][4] Aggregating the cited USDA figures, domestic production of beef, pork and chicken covers about 75 per cent of consumption of those three meats, a materially stronger position than most large food importers hold.

The weakness lies in the crop base underneath. Corn imports account for over 51 per cent of corn consumption, wheat production covers about 26 per cent of the 8.05 million tonnes consumed, and domestic soybeans supply 4 per cent of soybean use.[1][4] CONEVAL's national food self-sufficiency measure fell from 75 per cent in 2018 to 69.5 per cent in 2022, with 34 per cent of the population food-insecure.[19]

We apply a downward adjustment of 4 points because the nominal ratios flatter a base visibly at its physical limit. Irrigation District 025 in Tamaulipas authorised no irrigated corn area at all for 2025/26, Sinaloa dams stood at 29 per cent of capacity in February 2026 after touching 30-year lows of 13 per cent during the 2023-24 drought, Sonora wheat production fell 34 per cent on reservoir levels, and arable land per person contracted from 0.171 hectares in 2020 to 0.154 in 2023.[1][17]

Resource headroom: 38

Quantitative score 41, adjusted down 3 points

Mexico has chosen an efficient protein mix and financed it with another country's resources. Poultry and pork convert feed to protein far better than cattle, but feed costs exceed 60 per cent of production expenses in both sectors, so the resource base for Mexican protein growth is the American Midwest rather than Mexican soil.[4]

The domestic base has little room. Arable land is 10.3 per cent of territory.[17] Water stress under SDG indicator 6.4.2 stood at 44.95 per cent in 2022, of which agriculture accounted for 34.3 percentage points, and agriculture takes 76.3 per cent of freshwater withdrawals against renewable internal resources of 3,180 cubic metres per person and falling.[14][15][16] Capital from within the sector is scarce, with agriculture at 3.9 per cent of GDP but 11.6 per cent of employment,[18] non-performing agricultural loans up 83 per cent between January 2023 and September 2025, and white corn farmgate prices in February 2026 roughly 22 per cent below year-earlier levels and below production cost.[1]

One genuine headroom asset deserves naming: Mexico lands its own feed protein, with sardine catches of 650,545 tonnes and anchoveta of 308,621 tonnes in 2024 giving it a domestic fishmeal base most feed-importing nations lack.[28]

The national data confirm the district-level picture rather than complicate it. FAOSTAT's irrigation-equipped area rose steadily from 6.30 million hectares in 2000 to 7.30 million by 2019, then sat flat at 7.30 million hectares through 2024, a five-year plateau that begins exactly where District 025's refusals do.[45] Cropland fell from 25.38 million to 24.39 million hectares and arable land from 22.91 million to 20.00 million hectares over the same 2000 to 2024 window, so irrigation's rising share of cropland, 24.8 to 29.9 per cent, is a shrinking-denominator effect rather than new development, and cropland per person fell from 0.26 to 0.19 hectares.[46] Cosechando Soberanía, the government's flagship expansion programme, has not reversed the trend: USDA judges its effect on national corn output limited, and MY2026/27 corn production is forecast to fall a further 3 per cent to 24.5 million tonnes even as the programme scales toward 750,000 producers.[1] What the evidence rules out is a capital constraint: Mexico's agricultural credit orientation index stood at 0.73 in 2024 and agriculture, forestry and fishing took 2.25 per cent of total credit, above the 2.15 per cent world average and well above the United States' 0.67 per cent.[45] The binding constraint on this pillar is water and land, not financing. We apply a downward adjustment of 3 points for documented exhaustion of the irrigated growth base, evidenced by districts refusing allocations, Sinaloa planted area remaining 26 per cent below authorised levels even after dams partially refilled, and now corroborated by the national irrigation, cropland and arable-land series.[1][45][46]

Import exposure: 32

Quantitative score 28, adjusted up 4 points

Mexico's import exposure has an unusual shape. The volumes are enormous and supplier concentration is close to absolute, yet the route is a land border rather than a strait. The United States supplies over 99 per cent of corn imports, over 99 per cent of soybean meal, 81 per cent of wheat, roughly 90 per cent of dairy and, by one lender's estimate, 70 to 75 per cent of all agricultural imports.[1][4][31] Skimmed milk powder imports from the United States exceeded USD 1 billion in 2024, more than 40 per cent of the USD 2.5 billion in US dairy exports to Mexico, and whey imports of 46,120 tonnes came entirely from that origin.[5]

Policy has converted a commercial arrangement into a strategic vulnerability, though its precise form has shifted twice within the research window. A 25 per cent tariff applied to goods failing USMCA qualification from March 2025 until the US Supreme Court ruled the underlying emergency-powers tariffs unlawful on 20 February 2026; a 10 per cent replacement tariff took effect four days later, and the US Trade Representative added a further 10 per cent tariff on most Mexican goods from 24 July 2026 under a separate forced-labour investigation, with USMCA-qualifying goods excluded from all three measures.[32][33] At the first joint review on 1 July 2026 the United States declined to renew the agreement, placing it under annual review.[20][21] The closure of the US border to Mexican live cattle from May 2025 separately showed that the relationship can be shut unilaterally on sanitary grounds within days, and stayed shut for more than a year.[22]

We apply an upward adjustment of 4 points on two grounds a concentration calculation misses. First, no Mexican protein or feed import transits a maritime chokepoint: over 90 per cent of soybean meal arrives by rail, and vessel cargoes reach Veracruz, Coatzacoalcos, Progreso and Manzanillo from both oceans.[4] Second, substitution is operating rather than theoretical. Brazil's share of Mexican chicken imports rose from zero in 2013 to 24 per cent in 2025 while the American share fell from 98 to 73 per cent, the US share of soybean imports fell from about 85 per cent in 2020-22 to 75 per cent in 2023-25, and tariff-rate quotas set in January 2026 opened 51,000 tonnes of pork and 70,000 tonnes of beef to non-FTA suppliers.[2][3][4]

Upstream dependence: 32

Quantitative score 28, adjusted up 4 points

This is where Mexico is thinnest. Feed concentrate, fertiliser, genetics and energy all cross the same border. Domestic oilseed production averages about 6 per cent of domestic use, and soybean meal, the dominant protein in Mexican rations at roughly 80 per cent of meal-equivalent consumption, is over 99 per cent American where imported.[4] Around 70 per cent of fertiliser demand is imported, with PEMEX meeting a little over 30 per cent from output of 975,000 tonnes in 2025.[26] Urea and diammonium phosphate together represent about 35 per cent of corn production costs, so a fertiliser shock propagates straight into the corn Mexico still grows for itself.[1] Poultry, swine and dairy genetics are imported, and dairy yield gains are explicitly attributed to imported herd genetics.[5]

We apply an upward adjustment of 4 points for two funded, physical capabilities. Installed oilseed crush capacity of 11.5 million tonnes runs at only about 60 per cent utilisation, giving Mexico a route to substitute imported meal with domestically crushed beans and to switch origins, which crushers already do to blend American and Brazilian protein content.[4] And the fertiliser build-out is in the ground rather than in a press release, with PEMEX output up 21 per cent in 2025 and a MX$25 billion ammonia and urea plant at Poza Rica, designed for 708,000 tonnes of urea a year, having broken ground in 2025.[26]

Access and affordability: 69

Quantitative score 67, adjusted up 2 points

On national averages, Mexico's access position is comparatively strong. The share of the population unable to afford a healthy diet fell from 32.6 per cent in 2020 to 20.1 per cent in 2024, and the prevalence of undernourishment is low, at 2.7 per cent, down from 3.6 per cent in 2018.[34][35] Both figures place Mexico closer to the wealthier end of Latin America than to the region's food-insecure states.

The averages hide a less comfortable picture underneath. Child stunting stood at 12.5 per cent of children under five in 2022, above typical performance for upper-middle-income Latin America, and CONEVAL's own food-insecurity measure finds 34 per cent of the population without secure access, of which 6.4 percentage points is severe insecurity, concentrated in rural and southern indigenous states where market and road infrastructure are weakest.[19][36] Domestic food prices are volatile rather than simply high: year-on-year food inflation swung from a peak of 14.55 per cent in September 2022 to 1.66 per cent by June 2026, a range more than double the 6.08 per cent long-run average since 2003, so households cross the affordability line and return within a single price cycle.[37]

At 20.1 per cent, the affordability share puts the pillar at 67, on the strength of low undernourishment, held back by child stunting at 12.5 per cent and the CONEVAL distributional evidence above.[34][35][36]

We apply an upward adjustment of 2 points for the Anti-Inflation Decree, which caps prices on a defined basic basket including tortillas and was extended to 31 December 2026.[2] It is an instrument in force with administrative machinery behind it, and it sits on the maize staple that dominates bottom-quintile food spending, which is precisely the exposure this pillar measures. We do not credit it with the disinflation cited above: monetary tightening and falling world commodity prices ran alongside it, and no attribution study links the decree to that fall. The credit is 2 points, because an instrument whose price effect is not demonstrated earns credit for standing over the staple rather than for working, and the pillar's own volatility component already scores the realised outcome.

Shock endurance: 57

Quantitative score 52, adjusted up 5 points

Mexico endures through substitution and purchasing power rather than reserves. Stocks are thin. Corn ending stocks of 5.8 million tonnes against 51.5 million tonnes of consumption amount to about 41 days; wheat stocks of 345,000 tonnes against 8.0 million tonnes are about 16 days; feed mills hold roughly 20 days of yellow corn on a just-in-time rail model; and there are no government-held dairy stocks.[1][5] A national strategic grain reserve worth MX$100 billion was agreed on 17 December 2025, but volumes, locations and purchase prices remain undetermined, and carry no weight here.[23]

The offsetting strengths are substantial. Mexico earns hard currency from food, shipping USD 42.6 billion of agricultural goods to the United States in 2025, and at USD 13,988 GDP per capita it can outbid most of the world on commodity markets.[18][20] Its policy machinery also moves quickly, extending the Anti-Inflation Decree and setting fresh quotas within a single week in January 2026.[2]

Crisis purchasing power, which we weight at roughly a fifth of this pillar, is mixed rather than uniformly strong. Foreign-exchange reserves covered 3.75 months of imports in 2025, below the 2020 peak of 5.08, a middling buffer by international standards.[38] Mexico's stronger card is market access: it holds one of the world's few IMF Flexible Credit Line arrangements, an unconditional facility renewed on 13 November 2025 at SDR 17.8254 billion, about USD 24 billion, reduced from USD 35 billion as the authorities cut requested access from 300 to 200 per cent of quota, which still leaves privileged, continuing crisis financing that most import-dependent economies cannot draw on.[39] Social protection reaches 40.6 per cent of the population on World Bank ASPIRE data, but did not scale materially in the last major shock: CSIS, citing the IMF, describes Mexico's 2020 pandemic fiscal response as among the world's most frugal as a share of GDP.[40][41] Taken together, the purchasing-power component adds a modest positive to this pillar, carried almost entirely by continued IMF access rather than by reserve depth or a demonstrated capacity to expand social protection under stress.

We apply an upward adjustment of 5 points for adaptation demonstrated under live disruption. When the United States closed its border to Mexican live cattle, exports fell from a record 1.25 million head in 2024 to 230,000 in 2025 and to zero in 2026, and Mexico absorbed the loss by redirecting over a million animals into domestic feedlots, with beef production and consumption both forecast up 6 per cent as a consequence.[2][22] When beef prices rose 16.7 per cent year on year, consumers and processors shifted to pork and chicken within months.[3] The distributional weakness remains severe: with a third of the population food-insecure, price shocks convert into hunger immediately.[19]

Trajectory

Mexico's declared direction of travel is towards food sovereignty and its measured direction of travel is away from it. Cosechando Soberanía committed MX$53,971 million in 2025, rising to MX$83,760 million by 2030 and reaching 750,000 producers, with credit at 9 per cent and free crop insurance.[29] Beans have hit their target,[24] and the milk plan targets 15 billion litres by 2030 against about 13.3 billion in 2023.[25] Yet corn production is forecast to fall 3 per cent to 24.5 million tonnes in MY2026/27 while corn imports rise to a record 26.8 million tonnes.[1] The programmes are eligibility-restricted to holdings of 5 to 20 hectares, and USDA judges their effect on national output to be limited.[1]

Three things would do the most to reduce the dependence. A strategic reserve with published tonnage would lift endurance faster than any production programme. Delivery of the nitrogen build-out would address the input most tightly coupled to domestic yields. And feed diversification remains untouched: the Brazilian substitution achieved in chicken, pork and soybeans has no analogue in corn or soybean meal.

The risk running the other way is legible in a calendar. USMCA now faces annual review rather than a fifteen-year horizon, and lapses in 2036 absent three-way renewal.[20][21] Mexico's protein system is fast, cheap and efficient because it treats the United States as an extension of its own hinterland. Should that assumption require renegotiating every twelve months, a system holding twenty days of feed grain will discover quickly what its sovereignty is worth.

Sources

  1. Grain and Feed Annual, Mexico City (MX2026-0018) · USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (2026)
  2. Livestock and Products Semi-annual, Mexico City (MX2026-0012) · USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (2026)
  3. Poultry and Products Semi-annual, Mexico City (MX2026-0016) · USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (2026)
  4. Oilseeds and Products Annual, Mexico City (MX2026-0020) · USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (2026)
  5. Dairy and Products Semi-annual, Mexico City (MX2025-0024) · USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (2025)
  6. Poultry and Products Annual, Mexico City (MX2025-0045) · USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (2025)
  7. Food Balance Sheets: protein supply quantity, g/capita/day, element 674, item 2901 (Grand Total), Mexico and World, taken from the FAOSTAT data · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2025 (data 2023))
  8. Food Balance Sheets: protein supply quantity, g/capita/day, element 674, items 2941 (Animal Products) and 2903 (Vegetal Products), Mexico, taken from the FAOSTAT data · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2025 (data 2023))
  9. Food Balance Sheets: meat food supply quantity, kg/capita/yr, element 645, item 2943, Mexico and World · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2025 (data 2023))
  10. Food Balance Sheets: milk excluding butter, food supply quantity, kg/capita/yr, element 645, item 2848, Mexico · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2025 (data 2023))
  11. Food Balance Sheets: fish and seafood, food supply quantity, kg/capita/yr, element 645, item 2960, Mexico and World · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2025 (data 2023))
  12. Capture fisheries production (FAO FishStat) · Our World in Data (2026 (data 2024))
  13. Aquaculture production (FAO FishStat) · Our World in Data (2026 (data 2024))
  14. Level of water stress, SDG indicator 6.4.2, Mexico · UN Statistics Division SDG Indicators Database (FAO AQUASTAT) (2025 (data 2022))
  15. Annual freshwater withdrawals, agriculture (% of total freshwater withdrawal), Mexico · World Bank / FAO AQUASTAT (2025 (data 2022))
  16. Renewable internal freshwater resources per capita, Mexico · World Bank / FAO AQUASTAT (2025 (data 2022))
  17. Arable land (hectares per person and % of land area), Mexico · World Bank / FAO (2025 (data 2023))
  18. GDP per capita, population, agriculture value added and employment, Mexico · World Bank World Development Indicators (2025 (data 2024))
  19. Estudio diagnóstico del derecho a la alimentación nutritiva y de calidad 2024 (food self-sufficiency coefficient 75% in 2018 to 69.5% in 2022; food insecurity 17.7% mild, 9.9% moderate, 6.4% severe in 2022) · CONEVAL (Consejo Nacional de Evaluación de la Política de Desarrollo Social) (2024)
  20. July 2026 Mexico USMCA Review Report · MexAg, University of California, Davis (2026)
  21. USMCA 2026 Joint Review: United States declines to extend Agreement, triggering annual reviews · White & Case (2026)
  22. U.S. to resume import of Mexican cattle amid parasite outbreak · The Texas Tribune (2026)
  23. Mexico Agrees to Create National Strategic Grain Reserve · Mexico Business News (2025)
  24. Sheinbaum anuncia autosuficiencia en frijol con producción de 1.2 millones de toneladas (presidential announcement, 28 March 2026) · La Jornada (2026)
  25. Mexico Unveils Milk Self-Sufficiency Plan · Mexico Business News (reporting SADER, SIAP, AMLAC) (2025)
  26. Incrementa Pemex 21 por ciento producción de fertilizantes en 2025 (807,000 t in 2024 to 975,000 t in 2025: 165,000 t nitrogen, 590,000 t phosphate, 220,000 t urea) · PEMEX (Petróleos Mexicanos), official press release (2026)
  27. Industry statistics: egg and chicken meat production and per capita consumption · Unión Nacional de Avicultores (UNA) (2019 (data 2018))
  28. Anuario Estadístico de Acuacultura y Pesca 2024 (capture landings: sardine 650,545 t, anchoveta 308,621 t) · CONAPESCA (Comisión Nacional de Acuacultura y Pesca), Gobierno de México (2025)
  29. Presenta Gobierno de México plan para aumentar la soberanía y la autosuficiencia alimentaria (Cosechando Soberanía) · Secretaría de Agricultura y Desarrollo Rural (SADER), Gobierno de México (2025)
  30. Rising Dairy Demand Means Industry and Import Growth in Mexico · California Dairy Magazine (reporting USDA FAS) (2026)
  31. Mexico: A Long-Run Export Engine for U.S. Grains · Terrain (Farm Credit Services of America, American AgCredit, Frontier Farm Credit) (2025)
  32. United States terminates IEEPA-based tariffs following Supreme Court decision (Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, 20 February 2026; termination effective 24 February 2026, replaced by a 10% Section 122 tariff) · White & Case (2026)
  33. USTR Takes Action in Forced Labor Section 301 Investigations (10% tariff on Mexican goods not qualifying for USMCA duty-free treatment, effective 24 July 2026) · Office of the United States Trade Representative (2026)
  34. Share of population unable to afford a healthy diet, Mexico (Food Prices for Nutrition Data Hub, Herforth et al. 2022 method) · World Bank and FAO, via Our World in Data (2025 (data 2017-2024))
  35. Prevalence of undernourishment (% of population), Mexico · World Bank (FAO SOFI methodology) (2025 (data 2023))
  36. Prevalence of stunting, height for age (% of children under 5), Mexico · World Bank (UNICEF/WHO/World Bank Group Joint Malnutrition Estimates) (2024 (data 2022))
  37. Mexico food inflation (INPC food component, monthly history and peak value) · Trading Economics, sourcing INEGI (Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía) (2026)
  38. Total reserves in months of imports, Mexico (3.75 in 2025; 3.55 in 2024; 5.08 in 2020) · World Bank World Development Indicators (IMF International Financial Statistics) (2026 (data 2025))
  39. Mexico: IMF Approves New 2-Year US$24 Billion Flexible Credit Line Arrangement (PR 25/374) · International Monetary Fund (2025)
  40. Coverage of social safety net programs (% of population), Mexico · World Bank ASPIRE database (2025 (data 2022))
  41. The Covid-19 Pandemic Threatens Mexico's Economy (describes Mexico's 2020 fiscal response, citing the IMF, as among the world's most frugal as a share of GDP; no country-by-country comparison is given) · Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) (2020)
  42. Share of population unable to afford a healthy diet, Brazil (23.7 in 2024) and Thailand (16.8 in 2024) (Food Prices for Nutrition, Herforth et al. 2022 method) · World Bank and FAO, via Our World in Data (2025 (data 2017-2024))
  43. Prevalence of undernourishment (% of population), Brazil (2.5 in 2023) and Thailand (4.6 in 2023) · World Bank (FAO SOFI methodology) (2025 (data 2023))
  44. Prevalence of stunting, height for age (% of children under 5), Brazil (8.0 in 2019) and Thailand (12.4 in 2022) · World Bank (UNICEF/WHO/World Bank Group Joint Malnutrition Estimates) (2024 (data 2019 and 2022))
  45. Investment: Credit to Agriculture, Mexico: Credit to Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing, Total Credit, Share of Total Credit and Agriculture Orientation Index, 2000-2024 · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2026 (data 2024))
  46. Land, Inputs and Sustainability: Land Use, Mexico: Land Area Equipped for Irrigation, Cropland, Arable Land, absolute and per capita, 2000-2024 · FAOSTAT (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2026 (data 2024))

What we could not measure

Mexico's egg sector, central to its protein supply, has no verified volume more recent than 2018, when it stood at just under 23 kilograms per person; a widely repeated claim of nearly 400 eggs a year could not be confirmed. The strategic grain reserve agreed in December 2025 carries no published tonnage, so reserve cover rests on commercial stocks alone. Affordability and undernourishment figures are national averages only, with no state or income-quintile breakdown.

Published August 2026 ·How scores are produced