Farm & Food File
A syndicated column by Alan Guebert
Archives
Mitigation Money Should Fuel the Market; Not the Trade War
Posted on June 12, 2019
The month of May left as it arrived: riding in a rowboat from flooded farm field to flooded farm field across the Midwest. Worse, June is sloshing in with more rain, more mud, and more worry.
Complicating an already complicated spring, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue announced a broad, new scheme that could pay U.S. farmers up […]
“It Was Like Watching a Train Wreck Happen”
Posted on May 30, 2019
No one I know has ever witnessed a train wreck as it happened. As such, when a friend or colleague says or writes that an event “was like watching a train wreck happen,” I’m pretty sure it wasn’t like watching a train wreck happen.
Until Sunday, May 5, that is, when President Donald J. Twitter […]
Forecast for Trump Trade Talks: More Snow, Maybe Ice
Posted on May 2, 2019
If what we’re seeing now is the Trump trade “strategy”—cram trade talks between the U.S. and China, the U.S. and Japan, and the U.S. and European Union (E.U.) into an ever-tightening window—export-dependent American farmers and ranchers are in serious trouble for several reasons.
The first reason is the relentless calendar. Trade talks require years […]
Another War That Won’t End Any Wars
Posted on December 5, 2018
November 11 marked 100 years since the end of World War I, which U.S. President Woodrow Wilson called “the war to end all wars.”
Wilson saw himself as a historic peacemaker; instead he became an ironic phrasemaker. The Great War never brought an end to war, or even an end to that war. The then-raging Russian […]
Sonny Warned ‘Em–Twice, In Fact
Posted on November 29, 2018
It’s Thanksgiving week, so let’s be generous: The White House trade policy, marked by its heavy use of import tariffs and presidential tweets, continues to confound economists and trading partners alike.
A more accurate, less generous view of President Donald J. Trump’s trade policy would declare it an unhinged mess that has led to a dark, […]
Sometimes You Get What You Vote For
Posted on October 17, 2018
Farmers and ranchers spent most of last month hoping the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) recent crop estimates would be proven wrong and President Donald J. Trump’s “plan” to fix “the world’s worst trade deals ever” would be proven right.
September, however, disappointed them on both counts.
On Sept. 12, USDA reported that the already big 2018 […]
Checkbooks, Guns, and Baloney
Posted on August 10, 2018
The day U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue announced the White House plan to spread $12 billion of taxpayer salve on its festering tariff wound, November soybean futures ended their day completely unimpressed—down a sleepy 2.5 cents.
Farmers echoed the market reaction; they, too, were unimpressed with the bailout. “Trade, not aid,” was their polite, but […]
Make ZTE Great Again
Posted on May 30, 2018
If you think writing a farm bill makes for strange bedfellows, just look at who’s allied against President Donald J. Trump’s up-and-down trade talks with China: the deeply conservative Wall Street Journal and the decidedly undecided Financial Times, or FT.
On May 8, FT’s Martin Wolf described America’s “draft framework” guiding U.S-China trade talks earlier that […]
Too Many Cooks
Posted on July 31, 2017
Toques, the starched, stovepipe hats worn by chefs, are crowned with 100 tiny pleats that, explain the French, represent the 100 ways to prepare an egg every cook must master before earning the title “Chef” and a much-prized toque.
Recent action by President Donald J. Trump and his administration suggest there must also be 100 ways […]
Hard Numbers and Hard Politics
Posted on January 12, 2017
The calendar may have changed but the numbers all U.S. farmers will work with this new year are little different from the numbers everyone worked with last year.
For example, 2016’s corn production was baked-in last fall and so too are most of 2017’s options. We grew a staggering 15.3 billion bu. last year, will use […]
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Int’l Trade Comm numbers @SenJoniErnst, say it’s tiny: $2.2B boost in ag exports while ag imports up $3.1B (over 15 yrs!) In fact, new NAFTA ag sales won’t cover export sales lost to Trump tariffs & aren’t 1/10 tariff subsidies farmers will get. Both are, in a word, HUGE. https://t.co/s5NQhAPH5U
And that’s with China in a.) the middle of an economic slowdown and b.) buying every Brazilian soybean it can find. Yeah, wow. https://t.co/fZk1r7SDMC
The realities of rural vs. puffy political chatter. Spot on. https://t.co/CnriZY3QhG
Politico explains it as *legislation to give USDA authority over agricultural guest workers and eliminate minimum wages for those farm workers set by the Labor Department each year.* If so, all farm wages would go down. You forgot to mention that, SecSonny. https://t.co/IGSvk6Dh1l
It’s worse than that, @TimothyAWise: the author is decades-long former DC lobbyist for AmFarmBureau, a bona fide member of Big Ag’s *permanent govt.* This is why US farm policy rarely changes: its peddlers rarely change. https://t.co/nowc27rJpe