Heineken to invest over US$2.7B in Mexico through 2028

Bottles of Heineken beer are photographed in Washington, USA, March 30, 2018. (AP Photo/J. David Ake, FILE)

MEXICO CITY — Beer maker Heineken will invest US$2.75 billion in different projects in Mexico, the company’s CEO in the country said on Wednesday.

Oriol Bonaclocha said during Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum’s morning press conference that the investment will include the construction of a new factory in the country’s southeast.

The new plant in the state of Yucatan will have an initial production capacity of 4 million hectoliters and that amount is expected to be doubled in the future depending on the company’s needs, Bonaclocha said.

“We do not plan to close any factories, this is an expansion,” he added.

In April, Grupo Modelo, the producer of Corona and other Mexican beer brands, announced it would invest more than $3.6 billion in Mexico, despite concerns over water shortages in the country.

The relationship between beer makers and other industries like agriculture has been a longstanding issue in Mexico.

Almost three years ago, the construction of a Constellation Brands brewery in Mexicali was halted to protect local water resources and moved to Veracruz in eastern Mexico.

(Reporting by Raul Cortes and Aida Pelaez-Fernandez. Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Mark Potter)