Baja jobs

TIJUANA — Unprecedented public works expenditures across Baja California this year—an investment of more than $474 million--form the cornerstone of an economic plan for the state that Gov. Jose Guadalupe Osuna says will lead to the creation of 49,000 jobs.

The projects include completion a convention center for Tijuana and Rosarito Beach, the construction of a dam in Tecate, the and the rebuilding of earthquake-damaged canals in the Mexicali Valley.

Speaking at the state government offices in Tijuana’s Rio Zone, Gov. Osuna on Sunday morning outlined his state’s plans for 2012. He called it an “anti-cyclical strategy,” in the face of adverse global economic conditions.

Nearly half of the new jobs—more than 23,500—will be generated with public funds, he said. Public works projects would generate about 13,500 of those, while more than $94 million has been earmarked to stimulate the growth of small and and medium-sized businesses would generate another 10,000 new positions.

Under the plan, private investment would generate the remaining jobs.

“I think it’s a prudent figure,” Mario Escobedo Carignan, head of a business umbrella group, the Business Coordinating Council in Tijuana, said of the governor's plan for job creation. “But we’ve got to aim for much more.”