4. MEXICO'S FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
www.presidencia.gob.mx
This electronic portal of the Presidency of Mexico makes available day-to-day information on the most salient acts of Vicente Fox Quesada, President of Mexico, and other members of his administration, including sporadic reports on current legal developments. Although some information is also available in English and French, the most complete information is found only in Spanish.
www.directorio.gob.mx
This electronic portal is the official clearinghouse of the Federal government of Mexico. It provides a conduit to access any federal agency by simply typing up the name (in Spanish) of the agency in question. This portal claims to give access to 2,400 federal agencies.
From an administrative viewpoint, Mexico's federal government is structured in a centralized system known as the Federal Public Administration, as indicated earlier. This federal public administration resides in México, Distrito Federal (Mexico City or México, D.F.), which is the capital of the Republic of Mexico and the venue of its federal government (Washington, D.C. is the exact counterpart to México, D.F.).
Composed of eighteen Secretariats (Secretarías de Estado), the Presidential Cabinet is highly specialized and enforces all federal legislative enactments throughout the Republic of Mexico as part of the Executive Power in the specific fields of their administrative jurisdiction, as prescribed by the Federal Public Administration Act (D.O. of December 29, 1976, as amended). Furthermore, each of these Secretariats regularly engages in the preparation of legal memoranda or draft legislation in their respective fields of their administrative sphere, which are then submitted to the Office of the President for his consideration. Among the important functions of the President of Mexico is the constitutional right to introduce legislative bills to Congress (Art. 71). A substantial percentage of federal legislative enactments passed by Congress are initiated by the President of the Republic.
Each of the seventeen Secretariats sponsors its respective electronic portal. Evidently, these portals contain general and administrative information relative to the official work and activities of the Mexican federal agency in question. It should be noted, however, that a selected number of these agencies make available the texts of important legal materials, such as federal statutes, regulations, administrative resolutions, etc.
A case in point, for example, is the Secretariat of the Environment and Natural Resources whose official portal is: www.semarnat.gob.mx. This attractive portal has twenty five active frames in Spanish with information on: (1) Administrative requests and permits; (2) Transparency and Access to Information; 3) What is Semarnat?; (4) Semarnat's administrative structure; (5) What is new?; (6) Semarnat in the States, etc.
However, in this portal there are three active frames that should be of great interest to U.S. legal researchers because they make available Mexican legal materials relating to environmental questions. These active frames are:
- Normatividad y Leyes (Normativity and Laws):
www.semarnat.gob.mx
This "legal" sub-portal is divided into the following five sections:
1) Articles of the Federal Constitution
This section reproduces the texts of Articles 4, 25, 27, 73 and 115 of Mexico's Federal Constitution due to their importance in the environmental area.
- International environmental agreements
This useful and lengthy section makes available the texts of seventy-five international environmental agreements at the bilateral, regional and global levels to which Mexico is a party. The dates of signature and entering into force are also given, as well as the official language(s) of each agreement.
- Federal environmental legislation
This section makes available the texts of thirty-five federal statutes, regulations and decrees of interest in the environmental area. The substance of these federal legislative enactments includes fishing, national waters, vegetable health, forestry, environmental crimes, wildlife, vegetable varieties to environmental impact, etc.
- Regulations
This section reproduces the texts of twenty-five regulations in the areas of hazardous waste, marine pollution, mining, air pollution, the federal maritime land zone, utilization of marine spaces, etc.
Each enactment is identified by its official name (in Spanish), and the date of publication in the D.O. In addition, they may be downloaded in portable document format (PDF).
- NOMS
These "Mexican Official Norms" (Normas Oficiales Mexicans known by the acronym NOMS) are the technical specifications mandated by Semarnat, as published in the D.O. that must be complied with by commercial companies in a given environmental area.
-This section makes available the texts of ninety-seven NOMS divided into: (1) Primary Sector and Natural Resources (twenty-eight); (2) Energy and -Extracting Activities (nine); (3) Industry (twenty-seven); (4) Urban Development, Transport and Tourism (twenty-one); and (5) Emerging Norms (fifteen).
-Each NOM is identified by the official title, name, number, and date of publication in the D.O.
2. Enlaces (Links to Other Federal Agencies)
www.semarnat.gob.mx
This section gives access to fifty-four electronic portals of federal agencies whose functions and activities are related to the environmental area. The agencies are grouped This section gives access to fifty-four electronic portals of federal agencies whose functions and activities are related to the environmental area. The agencies are grouped into six categories: (1) Entities derived from Semarnat (five); (2) Entities connected with Semernat (two); (3) Secretariats and the Presidency (nine); (4) Parastate Public Administration (ten); (5) International organizations (nine); and (6) Other Sites of Interest (nineteen).
3. English Section
www.semarnat.gob.mx
This section provides information translated into English on the following twelve topics:
(1) Semarnat; (2) Mexico's Environmental Law; (3) Environmental Program 2001-2006; (4) Environmental Policy Background; (5) New Environmental Policy; (6) Protected Natural Areas; (7) Environmental Justice Program 2001-2006; (8) Environmental Crimes (Articles 414-423 of Mexico's Environmental Act); (9) Megadiverse Countries; (10) International Dialogue and Adaptation to Climate Change; (11) Our Main Achievements 2001; and (12) Our Main Achievements 2002.
The other electronic portals sponsored by Secretariats of State appear in Appendix II of this Note.
This article (Electronic Guide to the Best Mexican Law Web Sites) was posted in early January 2004 in the electronic website LLRX (www.llrx.com) thanks to the generosity of Ms. Sabrina I. Pacifici. |
