Canada’s livestock industry is insisting that its opposition to a duty on American corn, coming possibly as early as next week, is not an attempt to secure access to cheap feed so they can make a profit.
Instead, cattle and hog sector leaders told MPs last week that what they want is to ensure their input costs are not higher than those faced by their American competitors.
“We have heard accusations that cattle feeders are only interested in maintaining a cheap supply of corn from the United States,” Ontario Cattle Producers’ Association president and Canadian Cattlemen’s Association director Ian McKillop told the House of Commons agriculture committee.
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“The truth is not that we want low-cost corn but that we need cost parity between U.S. and Canadian cattle feed inputs. Feed cost parity is an absolute necessity for the long-term survival of the Canadian cattle feeding sector.”
Clare Schlegel, president of the Canadian Pork Council, reinforced the point. It is not cheap grain the sector needs but grain that is the same price in Canada and the U.S.
“Our dependence upon export markets for more than half our production requires that we have access to grain at internationally competitive prices,” he told MPs.
Both sectors said they support the corn campaign for better government support while incomes are low. But a border duty that would drive expansion of the value-added side of the industry to the U.S. is not the way to go.
“The imbalance in the subsidization situation between Ontario and the U.S. is a public policy issue and needs to be addressed by the Canadian public and not just by those of us who are users of corn,” said Schlegel.
The Canadian International Trade Tribunal is to rule by next week whether there is enough evidence of damage to impose an interim duty while public hearings are held.
The livestock sector leaders faced skeptical questioning from MPs after they suggested the real solutions are more taxpayer dollars and a subsidy-reducing World Trade Organization deal.
Saskatchewan Conservative David Anderson said he is a supporter of global competition.
“But the reality is that the U.S. treasury is subsidizing the price of corn by about 90 cents a bushel and most of the presentations we’ve heard are suggesting that Canadian farmers should just absorb that, and I guess I’m not finding that acceptable,” he said.
Ontario New Democrat Charlie Angus suggested corn users are benefiting from lower corn prices caused by American subsidies that allow U.S. farmers to sell at less than production costs.
“I can’t help but feeling at the end of the day, things are pretty good for you guys because of that distorted market.”
Liberal Wayne Easter, parliamentary secretary to agriculture minister Andy Mitchell, wondered if the government should consider a minimum price for farm products as the solution.
He speculated the government might set “by one means or another, a floor price equivalent to the United States because that’s pretty near the only solution in this dilemma.”
Schlegel said it could be a solution until the WTO creates a way to discipline American subsidies.
