In a recent radio interview, Mexico's finance minister Ernesto Cordero said Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) dollars are now expected to rise to at least $20 billion in 2011, which is up about 13 percent from last year. This number represents the total amount of money that foreign companies have invested in their Mexican business projects at the year's end.

"It will be a good year for taking in foreign direct investment," Cordero said in the interview. He then went on to add, "We hope to be up to around 20 billion dollars."

These predictions follow a strong year in 2010 where a number of large investments by the US, Spain, the Netherlands and Canada helped Mexico to become the sixth most popular destination for FDI, coming out ahead of other industrialized nations like Germany and the UK. As of February of 2011, the US had the largest amount of money invested in Mexico at 9 billion dollars (which is 50 percent of its total FDI), followed by Spain, the Netherlands and Canada.

Mexico's continued ability to attract foreign investment dollars is due in part to the current government's efforts to reduce the number of bureaucratic barriers and red tape during recent years. In fact, President Calderon directed an intensive federal regulation review and elimination process to remove pointless restrictions and rules in the nation's laws. This resulted in the removal of more than 14,000 regulations that affected business, capital investment, and fiscal operations, a move that is expected to continue to bolster FDI numbers throughout 2011 and beyond.