Since the federal government declared the railways as a strategic area, both for passenger and cargo transport , it decreed that the General Directorate of Railway and Multimodal Development (DGDFM) will become part of the Railway Transport Regulatory Agency (ARTF) .
Consequently, the ARTF, in coordination with the Secretariats of Infrastructure, Communications and Transportation (SICT) and Finance and Public Credit (SHCP), will carry out the necessary administrative acts to transfer the resources that have been assigned to them in the Federal Expenditure Budget for Fiscal Year 2025, within a period of no more than 20 business days following the entry of the decree.
“Formally, it will disappear, although in reality it will be incorporated into the ARTF, including its personnel and material and financial resources. It could be interpreted as a decision that will strengthen the Agency, given the expansion of responsibilities that this body will assume in this administration, in line with the experience of its director in the development of people mobility projects,” according to Carlos Barreda Westphal, director of the Ferroviaria.mx platform .
In this sense, he considered the scant participation of the DGDFM during the development and construction of the Mayan Train and Interoceanic railway projects during the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador to be a correct decision, “and the expected participation of the ARTF led by Andrés Lajous in the passenger train projects announced in the Mexico 2030 Plan in recent days.”
Similarly, the decree sent to the National Commission for Regulatory Improvement (Conamer) establishes that the matters in process that are handled by administrative units must be handled and resolved by them.
He stated that in light of the announced railway projects and in order to ensure the best possible organisation of work and speed up dispatch , “it is necessary to delegate powers to the head of the ARTF”, who will carry out 23 actions, such as proposing and, where appropriate, implementing policies and programmes for the development, promotion, supervision and logistics of the railway system, mass passenger transport and multimodal transport.
As well as planning strategic development in railway matters and processing requests related to the granting of concessions and assignments for the construction, operation and exploitation of general railway communication routes, in addition to establishing, modifying and approving the dimensions and characteristics of the right of way in the construction, reconstruction or modernization projects of the concessioned railways, among others.
It should be noted that this year the SICT will have a budget of 147 thousand 511 million 456 thousand 246 pesos, with the main projects being railways for freight and passenger transport, mass passenger transport, and the reconstruction and maintenance of roads.
It should be noted that the total resources are higher than those previously requested by the SICT, which were 140 thousand 799 million 46 thousand 115 pesos, that is, 4.7% more.
According to the calendar of the authorized budget for the fiscal year 2025 published yesterday in the Official Gazette of the Federation (DOF) , during this month, it will receive only 4,196,056,651 pesos, and February will be the month of greatest resources with 15,558,353,022 pesos.
While the DGDFM had been allocated 92 billion 28 million 187 thousand 428 pesos, however, these resources will be transferred to the ARTF after the aforementioned decree.
Meanwhile, according to calendar data, the ARTF was allocated 48 million 295 thousand 053 pesos , of which, in January it will receive four million 053 thousand 923 pesos, while it will not be until October when it registers the largest resource with five million 217 thousand 079 pesos, ending December with one million 401 thousand 870 pesos.
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