Farmscape for January 3, 2018

Manitoba's Agriculture Minister says he will focusing on common goals and common interests when he takes part in the 2018 Legislative Agriculture Chairs Summit in Kansas City, Missouri.
The Legislative Agriculture Chairs Summit hosted by State Agriculture and Rural Leaders, set for January 5th to 7th, will bring together elected state and provincial officials representing agricultural and rural issues to collaborate on shared priorities.
Manitoba Agriculture Minister Ralph Eichler says NAFTA negotiations will be a leading topic of discussion and his focus will be making sure Manitoba has a good deal for Manitoba.

Clip-Ralph Eichler-Agriculture Minister, Manitoba:
Agri-food and agri-food products make up 2.6 billion in trade just with the United States so it's a large part of our business, a large part of our economy.
We want to make sure that we continue with that and expand on that and find new and more value added and where we can meet priorities from each other that's going to make us both better.
Trade and relations to trade is one of the things that is paramount for us to survive.
We have been known as an export province.
We want to also be known as more value added.
We've had a trading deficiency over the past number of years.
I've welcomed the opportunity to talk about NAFTA and I think we should talk about NAFTA.
I'm not afraid of that conversation because I think we have a lot more to gain than we do to lose and by having those discussions I think we can open some doors that we may not have open before.
Without having the conversation it's hard to find a solution.
We find that, when we have opportunities like this, let's capitalize on it in order to make sure we're all at the table talking about common goals and common interests that's going to make us both better as a result of that.

Eichler says we know there are other trade opportunities, through CETA or through TPP but trade with our neighbors to the south is our main focus and where we want to stay now and into the future.
For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.

       *Farmscape is a presentation of Sask Pork and Manitoba Pork