WATERLOO, Ont. – Canada’s surging shipments of cattle and beef southward almost certainly will trigger a political, protectionist backlash in the United States, says the head of the top American cattle producer’s group.
Bob Drake, president of the National Cattlemen’s Association, said American cattle producers are starting to lose money and they are looking for someone to blame.
“In my area of Oklahoma and Texas, the primary blame falls on Mexico and in Montana, North Dakota and the Northwest, the primary blame will go to Canada,” he said during a visit to the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association annual meeting.
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He said protectionism is growing and efforts could be made to close or restrict the American border.
“There is a mood,” he said. “Our politicians listen to the voters. Cows don’t vote but people do, and a lot of people in my country are going to be storming the capital to do this.”
Drake said the real problem is that higher supplies of poultry, pork and beef have depressed prices. Revenues have fallen as much as $125 per animal sold this year.
Yet farmers are apt to blame import competition rather than higher domestic supplies for the problem.
NAFTA takes the blame
He said the North American Free Trade agreement, once strongly supported by cattle producers, is losing support. It is being blamed for increased competition and lower prices.
“The Canadian cattleman has the ability, the land and with feed prices falling because the end of the subsidy, the potential to increase drastically their meat production and their exports,” Drake said. “That could spell trouble.”
In fact, CCA officials expect Canadian cattle numbers to continue to increase for at least two more years. Since 1989, the percentage of Canadian production being shipped south has increased to 44 percent from 15 percent.
Drake said the NCA and the CCA should continue to promote the benefits of free trade and try to convince their members to resist protectionism.
One of the most effective deterrents to American action against Canadian beef imports is a fear that Canada would retaliate by restricting imports of American beef, he said.
“We have something called reciprocity. If you do it to me, I’ll do it to you. If you stop the trucks coming into the United States, I’ll stop the trucks coming into Canada.”
