The new president of Mexico has made one thing very clear in his first six months in office: He wants to see more baseball played south of the U.S. border. On Wednesday, Major League Baseball and USA Baseball announced plans to assist with that effort. On a sunny morning in Mexico City, MLB and USA Baseball launched the Fun At Bat program that will supply more than 1.3 million elementary students across Mexico with baseballs, softballs and bats to be used in physical education classes. The pilot program will begin in 200 schools in the capital city and expand to 3,300 national institutions in 2019.

The free program, which reaches more than 1 million children in all U.S. states, Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico, will be administered in Mexico by the Presidential Office for Baseball Development and Promotion in Mexico (PROBEIS), an initiative commissioned by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to develop and promote baseball in the country, supported by MLB and USA Baseball. In addition to the 200 schools in Mexico City, Fun At Bat will be introduced at 100 schools in each of the 32 Mexican states this year.