Canada's ambassador to Washington said Tuesday night that President Donald
Trump is wrong when he says Canada's trade practices in the dairy industry are
"very unfair." Ambassador David MacNaughton said in a letter to the
governors of Wisconsin and New York that Canada is aware of their letter to
Trump asking him to address Canadian dairy practices.
"Canada does not accept the contention that Canada's dairy policies are
the cause of financial loss for dairy farmers in the United States,"
MacNaughton said.
According to the Associated Press, MacNaughton said the facts don't bear that
out and attached a U.S. Department of Agriculture dairy outlook report that
"clearly indicates the poor results in the U.S. sector are due U.S. and
global overproduction."
Trump spoke out against Canada on Tuesday in a way he's not done before, saying
Canada has been "very, very unfair" to dairy farmers and "we're
going to start working on that."
Canada has decided to impose import taxes on ultra-filtered milk, a protein
liquid concentrate used to make cheese. It had been duty free but Canada
changed course after milk producers there complained. About 70 dairy producers
in both U.S. states are affected.
MacNaughton writes that the Canada dairy industry is less protectionist than
that of the U.S, which he says has employed technical barriers to keep Canadian
dairy out of the U.S. market.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is worried about Trump's protectionist
talk and has sent his ministers to the U.S. to talk about the importance of
Canada's trade relationship with the U.S. When Trudeau visited the White House
in February Trump praised the "outstanding" trade relationship
between the United States and Canada, saying he would only be
"tweaking" it going forward, reports the AP.
Relations with the U.S. are crucial as more than 75 percent of Canada's exports
go to the U.S., while 18 percent of U.S. exports go to Canada. There are fears
among Canadians that they could be hurt as Trump targets Mexico in a
re-negotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Source: USAgNet