Tensions mounted last week as the United States commerce department said it would investigate allegations that Canadian live hog exports are unfairly subsidized and are undercutting American producers.
The decision to investigate follows complaints filed March 5 by American hog producers that Canadian hog imports are unfairly priced. American producers want countervailing and anti-dumping duties imposed ranging up to 20 percent.
“It’s stressful and we feel that we are threatened,” said Canadian Pork Council president Edouard Asnong.
He insists Canadian producers will be cleared of the allegations. However, hog producers worry the investigation could drag on and discourage Canadian producers who export weanlings and slaughter hogs to the United States.
Read Also
Agriculture ministers agree to AgriStability changes
federal government proposed several months ago to increase the compensation rate from 80 to 90 per cent and double the maximum payment from $3 million to $6 million
“We certainly don’t need this,” said Alberta Pork chair Jack Moerman, who resides in a province where producers already have endured years of difficulty, including drought, high feed costs and bouts of depressed hog prices.
“We’re just going to have to watch and see how it unfolds and do our best to defend against the big brother to the south.”
The commerce department will examine whether the Canadian hog industry is unfairly subsidized. However, that is only one of what could be several steps this year dealing with U.S. producers’ complaints.
Questions of unfair pricing have yet to be cleared up by the U.S. International Trade Commission, which also would have the responsibility for determining whether any injury to American producers has occurred.
Depending on the outcome, preliminary duties could be imposed on Canadian live hog exports to the U.S. this summer or in the fall.
Ontario and Manitoba lead the country in exporting hogs to the U.S. Canada exported about 7.2 million hogs to the U.S. last year, with five million of those being weanlings.
Larry Friesen, a weanling exporter based at Rivers, Man., suggested the trade action is pushed by large U.S. hog corporations that want to drive family operations out of the industry in the American Midwest. The ability to draw weanlings from Canada has allowed those family farms to survive and avoid dependence on the larger corporations, he said.
“That is the bottom line of this trade action.”
Friesen, a director with the Canadian and Manitoba pork councils, said Canadian weanlings that are shipped into the U.S. command prices higher than those paid for weanlings produced in the U.S. American swine producer groups suggest Canadian swine are exported to the U.S. at prices below those in Canada.
