The United States Trade Representative (USTR) is preparing resolutions on whether or not it will impose safeguards to restrict imports of cucumbers, raspberries and pumpkins.
For these three products, the International Trade Commission (USITC) has already completed the analyzes in this regard commissioned by the USTR.
As in the cases of raspberries and pumpkins, the USITC analysis indicated that the Mexican production of cucumbers is more competitive than that of the United States, without specifying any type of distorting subsidy for it.
In particular, US imports of cucumbers from January to November 2021 were 916 million dollars, of which 577 million corresponded to shipments from Mexico and 325 million from Canada.
With the notable exception of labor, input costs are reported to be similar in Mexico and the United States due to the comparable costs of many inputs, including seeds, crop protection inputs and packaging materials, the USITC said of the report. cucumber production.
“However, due to higher yields in Mexico, unit costs may be lower for Mexican growers. For greenhouse systems, plants, including seeds, are a significant expense, as they are for some US growers, as is preparation for planting,” he said.
Indications are that while they have similar purchase prices for cucumbers, plant protection products represent a small portion of Mexican production costs due to reduced pest pressures from the arid climate in northwestern Mexico and the use of agricultural protected.
The USITC already determined in February 2021 not to impose tariffs on US imports of blueberries originating in Mexico.
Last September 2020, the USTR asked the USITC to initiate a global safeguard investigation of these imports under Section 201 of the Trade Act of 1974, a remedy it used for the first time in almost 20 years. These investigations also include strawberries and peppers.
“(The USITC determination on blueberries) revealed that this investigation was for electoral and political reasons,” said Luz María de la Mora, Undersecretary for Foreign Trade at the Ministry of the Economy, last year.
The Fresh Produce Association of the Americas argued that because cucumbers have different growing seasons in different regions, most Mexican cucumbers are imported in the winter months when most US growers are not producing cucumbers. .
Cucumber import volumes from Mexico decline in the summer months during the growing season for most states.
Only the southeastern United States has a growing season that overlaps with that of Mexico; however, growers in the southeastern United States do not represent the entire domestic cucumber industry and are also unable to meet the full demand of the US market.
roberto.morales@eleconomista.mx