Ecuador this month officially opened its market for imports of U.S. rough rice, paving the way for a “potential $155 million annual market” for American rice producers, USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service said Oct. 30. Ecuador’s announcement, which came after “consultations” with APHIS and industry officials, sets new interim entry requirements for U.S. rice. APHIS said it has notified U.S. exporters about the change and updated requirements in the Phytosanitary Export Database system on Oct. 24 to “allow shipments to initiate under the interim conditions that Ecuador set.” The agency added that Ecuadorian importers “have already arranged purchases under these terms.” A pest risk assessment is still pending by Ecuador’s national plant protection organization, APHIS said, and after that is performed the country will “make a final decision on requirements.”
USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service reminded exporters last week of a recent development in Mexico’s implementation plan for new import labeling requirements, which could impact U.S. exports. Phase two of the implementation, which began Oct. 1, will include “changes to mandatory evaluation and calculation levels for caloric value, sodium and sugar” for certain processed foods and nonalcoholic drinks, the agency said. Mexican authorities will be assessing whether they should set “new thresholds for ingredients determined as excessive,” and those products could be subject to a “new warning label or a precautionary legend.”
U.S. agricultural exports could take a hit due to ongoing border closure between the Dominican Republic and Haiti, USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service said in a recently released report. USDA said the border was closed due to a dispute over the construction of a canal on the Haitian side of the Dajabon River, affecting trade between the two sides, including U.S. agricultural exports that are delivered to the D.R. before then being exported to Haiti.
Brazil, Canada and Mexico recently announced antidumping and countervailing duty actions and decisions on certain products from mainland China, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council reported Oct. 16.
The Dominican Republic is beginning to receive Brazilian pork and beef products, which could affect U.S. exports, the USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service said in a recent report. The agency said Brazil announced Aug. 9 that it had “opened the market for pork and beef products” in the D.R., and although Brazilian beef is subject to a 40% tariff and pork is subject to a 25% tariff, Brazilian meats have “proved to be extremely competitive” in the D.R. USDA said U.S. pork exports in particular are expected to “be fiercely challenged” by Brazilian pork shipments to the D.R. The U.S. “supplied 91 percent of total pork exports” to the D.R. last year (see 2302220019), USDA said.
The U.S. and the Dominican Republic recently agreed to “significantly reduce” restrictions the D.R. had established on American poultry after a 2022 outbreak of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service said in a report this week. The agency said the new requirements will allow U.S. counties free of HPAI to export their poultry to the D.R., and the USDA expects the change will allow U.S. poultry producers to regain the market share they lost to Brazilian poultry exporters in the D.R. “This will represent additional exports of millions of dollars for U.S. poultry producers in 2023 and beyond,” USDA said. The agency said it worked with several D.R. government agencies and senior government officials to convince the country to reduce the restrictions.
The panel deciding whether Mexico's policy on genetically modified corn breaks the rules of the USMCA will probably rule by March 2024, Mexican Economy Minister Raquel Buenrostro said at a press conference in Washington after the High Level Economic Dialogue meetings Sept. 29.
It's not realistic to believe Canada, Mexico and the U.S. would be ready to admit more members to the USMCA before their presidential contests in 2024 or Canada's parliamentary elections in 2025, panelists said at a program hosted by the Council of the Americas. But Juan Carlos Baker, Mexico's former chief negotiator for the NAFTA successor, said the six-year review in 2026 would be a perfect time to make accession a possibility.
Allegations that Diesel Canada,Hugo Boss Canada and Walmart Canada purchase garments that were made in part with Uyghur forced labor -- complaints that rely on Australian Strategic Policy Institute reporting in 2020 and Sheffield Hallam University reports -- will progress to a fact-finding investigation after the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE) found that the companies' responses weren't satisfactory.
U.S. rice exports to Costa Rica have “plummeted” following Costa Rica’s decision a year ago to reduce tariffs on rice from all origins, USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service said in an Aug. 25 report. The agency said American rice exports to Costa Rica fell 98% through June since the tariff reduction, adding that as “tariffs on South American-origin rice fell to 5 percent in August 2022, purchases of U.S. rice all but stopped."