Mexico's Stetson summit

Key issues: Immigration, drugs and trade

By Central American correspondent Peter Greste

Forget the stiff suits, the official dinners and the formal protocols - George W Bush's first foreign trip to see his Mexican counterpart Vicente Fox will be a meeting of cowboy presidents, complete with Stetson hats, leather boots and horses.

And never mind the gilt-edged official presidential residences and polished five-star hotels of Mexico City - this meeting is taking place at Fox's ranch in the one-horse town of San Cristobal in the central state of Guanajuato.

Mexican footwear: These boots are made for talking

It has been a refreshing change for Mexicans, used to seeing their presidents as aloof and distant powerbrokers.

Both leaders are relative newcomers to their jobs.

Vicente Fox only placed his famously monogrammed leather cowboy boots under the presidential desk last December.

His open and charismatic style has made him hugely popular at home where he's seen more as the Chief Executive Officer of "Mexico Inc" than a politician.

Safe choice

Analysts say President Bush has chosen Mexico for his first foreign visit because it is an ideal and relatively safe way for him to dip his toe in foreign affairs, and satisfy a huge and influential constituency of Latino voters.

Bush is not travelling far beyond US borders on his first foreign trip

He is also not that far from home.

As the governor of the border state of Texas, Bush worked hard to improve relations with his southern neighbours. He also speaks a respectable smattering of Spanish.

Both leaders will be hoping for a relatively smooth meeting to kick off what many analysts say is an ideal opportunity to forge a new positive relationship between the two often frosty neighbours.

Key issues

There are three key issues that have been at the top of the bilateral agenda for much of the past decade and those will feature again when the presidents sit down at San Cristobal:

• Mexican migration over the border

• bilateral trade

• drug trafficking

Migration is expected to be at the centre of talks - Vicente Fox has pledged to fight for the better treatment of Mexican workers inside the US.

There are an estimated two million Mexicans living illegally over the border, many of them underpaid and working in dire conditions.

Easier access

The Mexican Government wants the US to recognise the fact that its cheap labour has contributed in no small measure to its economic prosperity.

Vicente Fox: Open and charismatic style

"The American economy could not grow at rates of 5% [a year] if not for the high quality, high productivity work of Mexican migrants," President Fox said earlier this week.

He wants Washington to issue widely available guest-worker visas that allow migrant labourers to move back and forth without having to illegally run the gauntlet of the US border defences.

It is a politically sensitive issue inside the US, but a bi-national commission this week recommended just such a programme, that treats migration as "an opportunity and not a problem".

Nafta boost

Trade is another issue high on the agenda that both leaders hope to gain from.

President Fox has floated the idea of a more open trade frontier that would eventually turn the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) into something closer to the European Union.

Economists say the agreement, which embraces Canada, Mexico and the US, has been the engine that has driven Mexico's growth of between 5-7% over the past three years.

President Fox is counting on further growth to fuel the economy and fund his plans to improve the lot of the 40-million Mexicans living in poverty.

More power, less drugs

But President Bush also has some very specific demands.

He is already talking of asking Mexico to help supply energy to the electricity-starved border states like California.

He will also be demanding more action from Mexico on the vast narcotics smuggling industry, which supplies the US with 60% of its cocaine.

It is a big request - the industry is deeply entrenched in Mexico, with support from corrupt officials in the police force, the judiciary and in politics.

Friday's one-day summit is unlikely to produce extraordinary results, but political analysts on both sides of the frontier believe that with two new and relatively like-minded leaders in place, there is an unprecedented opportunity to forge a new and co-operative relationship between the once antagonistic neighbours.