The economy has opened up dramatically over the past two decades, but there are few opportunities for women. Beatriz Tumoine wanted to be a doctor. A gifted student, at 16 she won a place at the medical school of the prestigious Tecnológico de Monterrey university, about 220 miles from her home in Torreón, northern Mexico. But her parents would not let her enroll. “My dad wouldn’t even consider it,” says Tumoine, now an executive at building materials group Cemex, one of Mexico’s most successful multinational companies. “I thought my grandfather, a doctor, would support me. But he said it was a very demanding career and, for a woman, may not be the best choice.” Tumoine was devastated — but in provincial 1980s Mexico, she says, they “just didn’t know” any different. |