A new joint study conducted by the University of San Diego’s Trans-Border Institute and the Igarapé Institute, a research center located in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, entitled “The Way of the Gun: Estimating Firearms Traffic Across the U.S-Mexico Border,” concludes that ongoing government efforts to regulate firearms trade and trafficking across the U.S.-Mexico border are largely ineffective. According to the report, “Notwithstanding improvements in the efficacy of Mexican authorities in seizing illicit firearms between 2008-2009, they are still meager in relation to the overall volume of weapons likely crossing the border.” The new report estimates the value of the annual weapon smuggling trade is $127.2 million.

The report’s preliminary findings show that:

• A significant proportion of U.S. firearm dealers are dependent on Mexican demand;

• A sizeable and growing percentage of U.S. firearms sales are destined for Mexico;

• The volume of firearms crossing the U.S.-Mexican border is higher than previously assumed;

• The value of firearms sales destined for Mexico are significant and growing appreciably; and

• The U.S. and Mexican authorities are seizing a comparatively small number of firearms at the border.

The study urges more sophisticated U.S. background checks of buyers to help identify “straw purchasers” and the development of a database of seized guns in Mexico. It suggests that U.S. authorities gather more data on sales tax revenue from gun stores by county “to identify unusual activity that should be investigated.”