Manitoba Pork Calls for Creation of Strategic Plan for Dealing with Trade

Nov 18, 2024

In the wake of last week's U.S. election, the General Manager of Manitoba Pork is calling on the federal government to develop a national strategy for agriculture and food trade. Last week Donald Trump regained the U.S. presidency.

As part of an article distributed through Manitoba community newspapers and Manitoba Pork's web site Manitoba Pork General Manager Cam Dahl suggests, as Canada heads into the 2026 review of the Canada U.S. Mexico Agreement, the first step would be to have a strategic plan for agriculture and food trade but he sees no evidence of the existence of such a plan.

Quote-Cam Dahl-Manitoba Pork:

I think what we're seeing is a return to more protectionist times in the world of trade and that includes agriculture and food trade.Really what we need from our government is to aggressively fight for our market access and I think that really begins with the United States.

We see a really more protectionist sense coming from the U.S. and that would have occurred no matter who won the White House and Congress last week in the U.S. election.We've heard of President Trump talking about tariffs.

On the other side of the political divide, Vice President Harris was one of only 10 Senators to vote against the Canada-U.S.-Mexico trade agreement so protectionism was coming and I think that there's no question that CUSMA, the old NAFTA, is our most important agreement.The U.S. is our most important customer and Mexico is either third of fourth on the list when we're looking at pork but it's not just pork.It's most agriculture products.That is our most important market in terms of volume but it's also our most important market in terms of geography.

Access is much more strait forward so we really need to have our government bring the industry and provincial governments together to develop a strategic plan for reaching out to our U.S. partners and ensuring that that border stays open.

Dahl says reducing costs within the supply chain benefits farmers on both sides of the border and pulling costs out of the system helps consumers because they have reliable access to better priced products.Dahl's article can be found through Manitoba Pork's web site and Manitoba community newspapers.

Source : Farmscape.ca

Video: Food Inflation and Pork Demand - Dr. Sylvain Charlebois

In this episode of The Swine it Podcast Show Canada, Dr. Sylvain Charlebois, Professor and Director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University, discusses how food inflation is reshaping Canadian protein demand. He explains why pork remains competitively priced, consumer behavior, and why transparency, AI-assisted shopping, and protein demand will matter in the years ahead. Listen now on all major platforms!

"The potential of pork is there. We just need to see the product assume that role and take it away because all the elements are there."

Meet the guest: Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Professor in Dalhousie University's Faculty of Management and Director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab. His research focuses on food distribution, food policy, food safety, food security, and traceability. Dr. Charlebois has written four books and more than 500 peer-reviewed and scientific articles. He holds a BComm from the Royal Military College, an MBA from UQAM, and a DBA from the University of Sherbrooke. Learn more from Dr. Sylvain Charlebois on The Swine it Podcast Show Canada, available on all major platforms.