Mexico predicts drop in tortilla prices

Mexico's economy secretary said he was confident tortilla prices, which have skyrocketed over the past year because of high international demand for corn, will stabilize in less than a month.

Several government departments will monitor corn-tortilla prices three times a week while officials wait for the market to regulate prices, Eduardo Sojo said Monday. Prices have risen as much as 14 percent in the past year and led to threats of protest by unions and opposition leaders.

Sojo announced last week the government had authorized duty-free imports of 716,500 tons of corn to drive down tortilla prices. But he warned that any price relief would not be immediate, with the corn imports hitting the Mexican market in February.

"We're going to see how the markets work and we hope that they (prices) stabilize in the next two or three weeks," Sojo said Monday during a business convention.

Later Monday, President Felipe Calderon met with economy officials and Mexico's Central Bank Gov. Guillermo Ortiz to "follow up on the strategy employed to stabilize the price of the tortilla," according to a news release issued by the president's office.

During the meeting, officials "reiterated a promise to apply the full weight of the law to those who commit abuses," the release said.

The federal government's antitrust watchdog first said last week that it was investigating allegations that companies were manipulating corn prices and colluding to limit supply.

Unionists and members of the opposition left-leaning Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, have called on the government to institute price controls on staple foods including tortillas and milk.

PRD spokesman Gerardo Fernandez said the party would coordinate national protests with other social and political groups and that some federal lawmakers planned to demonstrate in front of the Economy Department's offices on Tuesday.

For low-income Mexicans, who earn about $18 a day on average, the increasing prices have hit hard.