Willacy County officials are hopeful they will offer businesses operating at Port Mansfield and beyond access to a new foreign-trade zone in the coming years.

In August, the county and McAllen Foreign Trade Zone Inc. applied to the federal government to add Willacy County to the existing foreign-trade zone.

“We’re looking forward to it being approved at the federal level and it’s county-wide. So we feel that will also help bring in more businesses, whether it’s from our friends to the South or anywhere for that matter,” Willacy County Judge Aurelio “Keter” Guerra recently told the Rio Grande Valley Business Journal. 

Foreign trade zones are where products or raw materials can be imported into the U.S. and stored without paying tariffs until sold.