A day doesn’t pass by where someone isn’t reporting on trade agreements and trade negotiations. A farmer commentator sent me this piece on what he thinks trade should be. Rolf Penner raises hogs, grain and special crops at Morris, MB.

It’s a trade war. One that really doesn’t matter to the Americans and puts one ag sector against the other in Canada. I can’t believe how we are so prone to shoot ourselves in the foot. Be that as it may. The Canadian Pork Council will press for the elimination of countervail and antidumping duties on imported unprocessed U.S. grain corn when the Canadian International Trade Tribunal begins pubic hearings next week.

Many are wondering where the outcry is about the discovery of the latest BSE cow in the United States. In my opinion, it never was about health, but about markets or the lack there of. When Canada discovered its first BSE-infected cow in May of 2003, the outcry reverberated around the world.
In Canada, many said it would be the death knell for the beef industry. How wrong they were. Do any of you remember when the latest BSE discovery occurred in Canada? I didn’t either. I had to look it up on the World Wide Web. It was back in January 2006, not 2005, or 2004. We have short memories. That goes to prove my point it’s all about the markets, and has very little to do with health.

In my opinion is we need to lay this puppy to rest. Having Canadian corn users fighting with grain corn producers makes no sense at all, especially when it doesn’t really matter to the Americans. Lawyers representing the Animal Industry Corn Users suggest, if the Canada Border Services Agency follows its own guidelines, duties on U.S. corn entering Canada will be reduced substantially when it announces final subsidy and dumping determinations March 15.

A fine wine sometimes needs some time. And that’s the way our USTR, Rob Portman looks at the U.S./EU Wine Accord. It looks like we’ve reached an agreement, sort of. At least a beginning of an agreement. Actually a Wine Accord. It only took 20 years to get this far.

With the Americans signing more Free Trade agreements all the time, Canada needs to do the same.

Saskatchewan Agriculture and Food says a combination of factors will keep hog prices volatile with some strengthening as we move toward spring. Brad Marceniuk said while live hog prices have continued to fluctuate, they have improved since the beginning of February when higher U.S. slaughter numbers and higher volumes of chicken and pork in cold storage pushed prices down.

American production of field peas and lentils has risen dramatically in response to government support under the Loan Deficiency Payment program. My colleague Kevin Hursh in Saskatoon, SA says back in 2002, the U.S. placed pulse crops under the LDP effectively guaranteeing producers a floor price. A report just released from Agriculture Canada shows the subsequent acreage and production increases.

Canada Western Red Spring wheat can once again enter the United States, duty free. A U.S. tariff that stopped imports of Canada’s largest crop since 2003 has been fully dismantled, cementing a major NAFTA victory for western Canadian farmers. On February 24, the U.S. Customs notified all American ports of entry that imports of Canadian hard red spring wheat are …

It looks like Canada’s new Ag Minister is retreating from making changes to the Canadian Wheat Board, at least not quickly. In meeting with CWB officials, Manitoba’s Ag Minister Rosann Wowchuk, and reporters after the meeting, Strahl said, “What I said to the wheat board’s board of directors is the same thing that I’ve been saying publicly . . . that our campaign promise was to move toward dual marketing.”