Farmscape for May 23, 2019

With the lifting of U.S. tariffs on imported Canadian and Mexican steel and aluminum and the resulting retaliatory, tariffs the National Pork Producers Council is shifting its focus to ratification of the USMCA and seeing the end of the U.S. trade war with China.
The United States has lifted duties imposed last year on steel and aluminum imported from Canada and Mexico and, in turn, Canada and Mexico have ended retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products.
Jim Monroe, the Senior Director of Communications with the National Pork Producers Council, says it's great news that zero tariff pork trade has been restored to Mexico and we can now look forward to swift ratification of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement  and preserve zero tariff pork trade for the long  term.

Clip-Jim Monroe-National Pork Producers Council:
We're turning our focus to a couple of things.
Ratification of the USMCA, we will be watching very closely how members of Congress vote on that.
We'll be managing it as a key vote and tracking closely those who support and those who don't support the agreement.
I would say the other issue that we're really focused on now is China.
There is an unprecedented sales opportunity in China.
It's always been an important market but what we have shipped there in the past pales in comparison to the potential now, given the drop in domestic production in China with the African Swine Fever outbreak in that country.
Right now we're facing 62 percent tariffs there.
Most of that is punitive tariffs because of the ongoing trade dispute so we are really pushing for an end to that trade dispute.
That is the largest pork consuming nation in the world.
Pork is a staple of the Chinese diet and they are in need of supply and there is no better supplier and more reliable supplier of pork than the United States.

Monroe says the growth potential in China is tremendous if U.S. pork producers can get out from under the punitive tariffs they currently face.
For farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.

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