Under Mexican law, landholdings that exceed the legal limits or are left idle may be expropriated and given to groups of campesinos to use as an ejido, a type of communal farm.
Under those reforms, ejido farmers would be able to gain title to their land, join ventures with U.S. agribusinesses and boost productivity with capital from their technologically advanced partners.
If Mr. Salinas's initiative to amend the constitution succeeds, ejido members will be guaranteed titles for their plots, with which they will be able to do as they please. "The operative word is `choice,'" says PRI president, Luis Donaldo Colosio.
Large land holdings were expropriated by the state and divided among millions of peasants, who were organized into ejido collectives by the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI).
"The ejido was the whole foundation of agriculture in Mexico and we're finally accepting that it isn't working any more," says Mr. Bonilla.
Government officials say Salinas' policy of selling publicly held companies wont't extend to the ejido system, a fundamental reform of the 1910-21 Mexican Revolution.
Under the current "ejido" system, the federal government is the sole owner of the majority of cultivable land.