Canada

Canada and the United States are a global example of cross-border trade in food and agriculture products, forecast to exceed $65 billion this year. But Arun Alexander, Canada's deputy ambassador in Washington, said Tuesday "we are concerned about the real world consequences" of changing the rules on the voluntary "Product of USA" label.

Bipartisan bills in the House and Senate, inspired by rising international tensions, would block China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea from buying U.S. farmland or agricultural companies, said sponsors on Thursday.

An international panel will hear renewed U.S. complaints that Canada is blocking dairy imports, said the Biden administration on Tuesday. The two nations held fruitless consultations in mid-January, so U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai demanded a ruling from a dispute resolution panel — a request that is granted automatically under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement.

The U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement is six months shy of its third anniversary and the United States already has requested a third set of bilateral consultations over its objections to Canada's dairy quota system. U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai announced the request on Tuesday, saying the government has identified additional aspects of Canadian import rules that violate its agreement to allow a larger volume of U.S. dairy imports.

Accusing Canada of backsliding on its commitments, the United States requested consultations on Wednesday with its northern neighbor over dairy import quotas that limit American access to the Canadian market. U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai said Canada has expanded its restrictions despite being the loser in a USMCA trade ruling.

In the first decision under the new North America trade pact, a three-judge dispute settlement panel ruled that Canada had manipulated its tariff-rate quotas to limit imports of U.S. dairy products, despite agreeing to greater U.S. access in the 2020 agreement. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the ruling was a signal of U.S. resolve against unjustified trade restrictions anywhere.

U.S. wheat exports are slowing due to high prices and rising global production, said the Agriculture Department on Thursday. "U.S. export prices are expected to remain elevated [for] the rest of 2021/22, further diminishing U.S. competitiveness," said the USDA's monthly WASDE report.

The Trump administration said it was challenging Canadian quotas on dairy imports as unfair to U.S. milk producers. The challenge, announced on Wednesday, was the first under the United States-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement.

China is stepping up its purchases of U.S. farm exports, but it will not meet the ambitious sales goals of the "phase one" agreement that de-escalated the Sino-U.S. trade war, said USDA data on Wednesday. In a quarterly forecast, USDA analysts said China, the farm sector's No. 1 customer before the trade war, will remain locked in third place as an export destination in 2021, behind Canada and Mexico.

President Trump told the USDA on Wednesday to provide trade war relief to U.S. lobster fishermen and producers and threatened retaliatory tariffs on seafood from China if Beijing fails to buy massive amounts of U.S. food, agricultural, and seafood products this year.

The United States “should look at the possibility of terminating” trade agreements that allow cattle imports into the country, said President Trump on Tuesday — a suggestion that would almost solely affect Canada and Mexico, partners in the USMCA. The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association …

Despite interest among cattle activists, a return to mandatory country-of-origin labels on beef "is not going to happen unless we want to do a billion-dollar litigation damage with Mexico and Canada," said Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue on Wednesday.