U.S.-Mexico tomato deal looks dead

09/27/2012 11:54:00 AM
Tom Karst

Political parlay?

Brown refuted allegations that the Commerce Department acted for political reasons. He said growers in Florida may have lost $100 million to $150 million last season, with three multi-generational companies closing their doors.

“We cannot sustain an agreement that is tilted very heavily in favor of the import industry,” he said.

What’s more, Brown called the idea that Mexico grows different type of tomatoes than the U.S. a “crock.”  “There’s a domestic greenhouse industry that grows exactly the same thing the Mexicans grow, and there’s a field industry that grows exactly the same thing the Mexicans grow, so there’s no difference in the product,” he said.

During the 16 years of the suspension, he said the U.S. tomato industry shrank as Mexico’s almost doubled.

“Now tell me the suspension agreement is something the domestic industry should want to sustain,” he said. “That’s why 90% of the domestic industry spoke up and said we can’t do this anymore.”

The Department of Commerce said 80 U.S. tomato growers representing 90% of U.S. production had no interest in continuing with the suspension agreement, satisfying the 85% threshold for consulting “substantially all” domestic producers.

Jungmeyer said growers and exporters believe the Department of Commerce should review those numbers.

“We believe (claims of 90% support) is not right and they are basing that data on some information from USDA ERS that only includes data from 20 states,” he said.

The Commerce Department’s preliminary decision notice and the preliminary  decision memo  are online.

Comments (19) Leave a comment 

The Florida Tomato Cartel...insuring the Five Families of the Florida Tomato Mafia make
New York's Families look like amateurs....

Hooray for the politicization of our nations food supply! Everyone is eager to fight terrorism abroad, but when Florida tomato producers hijack our nations food supply it's not terrorism, it's politics.

Food security is national security and these Florida tomato producers care only about themselves, not the large number of US consumers who are being harmed by their greed.

I guess we will just have to do without tomatoes for the remainder of the winter the next time Florida freezes.

The cost of American regulation alone for at least Greenhouses is approaching 25-30% of the summer priced tomatoes coming across the border. And that is increasing by the year.

Do you really want to completely turn your food supply over to another country? That's what we are doing. I think that would be a mistake.

I guess you feel it better to have the Florida Taliban setting prices every tuesday behind closed doors....

The last time Florida growers screwed the Mexican Tomato growers, the apple category suffered the burden of retaliatory dumping tariffs. The apple growers will again pay for Florida insanity.

we should support our own farmers instead of the mexicans

Unfortunately your own farmers can't cover the American demand therefore you need us "mexicans" as you so call them.

If I was a Florida grower I would also be clawing like a cat that's trying to be thrown into a river,but the tide cannot be stopped by those who choose to live on the waterfront.

Who's to stop Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador or Cuba from doing tomato business with the USA?

Simple laws of supply, demand & protectionism under CAPITALISM;

If foreign product cannot come in to the states due to a prohibitly workable tariff, it will be very interesting to see the retailers association's response and pressure, needless to say the other 'sectors' reversing this act if it even reaches the Florida Grower's illusion.

This reminds me of a movie I once saw:

'Whatcha got ain't nothin new. This country's hard on people, you can't stop what's coming, it ain't all waiting on you. That's vanity'

'No country for old men'

Why don't we make just Mexico a state and get this over with.

To some it probably seems odd that Florida growers would ask for a suspension of an agreement that sets a minimum price for Mexican imports. On the surface it would seem that a set minimum would be good for all parties. These minimums create a false sense of security as to profits and therefore tend to cause an increase in acreage. A few years back Florida growers through the FTC adopted a resolution that imposed a minimum of 5.00 + on each box of packed tomatoes. It only took a few years to see that through market manipulation one could get around the minimum. When over production occurred because of the increase in acreage, sales teams offered incentives to buyers to move the excess product. It took only a few short years for the Florida tomato growers to realize they can not dictate consumption, and price The American consumer has a way of reminding us that it is still a supply and demand system. Thanks, E. Mott

Raise the import minimum to reflect our US annual increases in labor and production
costs in America.
Never saw retail or food service prices drop on the end user; the American consumer.
I did experience the wholesale tomato prices drop by 40-50% last season due to
import flood.
Farmers receive "maybe" $.20 of the selling dollar; the rest goes to the middlers.
Brokers on the border need to know which side of the border they are on.

We shall see what happens this winter if Florida freezes again like it did 2 years ago. C'mon Mother Nature. Let's teach the greedy a lesson.

We only grow and harvest about 3% of fruits and vegetable here in the UNited States. The majority of crops in the US now get turned into High Fructose Corn Syrup. You know, the stuff that makes us all fat.

Amen.

I've lived in Florida for over 30 years, & i once was a farm labor contractor for the comglomerates of Florida Tomato business. They also have warehouses in Nogales & Texas and there 3rd party brokers that buy tomatoes to cover there lack of production to keep up with the supply. They repack them put them into there trademarked fancy names and sell them to the American consumer. It's funny, the last 3 years has been the worst for Florida Farmers as thier lands have been farmed past the rotation point. This summer Florida tomatoe was being sold at $3-$6 since the crop was small and poor quality. If you look back at summer import prices this summer where at $7-$9. As you can see the comglomerates who make billions every year, dont just want a piece of the pie they want the bakery.

We would have plenty of supply if they would not have started NAFTA in the first place. When Mexico pays less for labor, has no gov regulations to deal with, and spray what ever banned pesticides they feel like, they are able to ship tomatoes across the border cheaper than US growers can even produce them much less harvest, sell, and ship. Thus putting US tomato growers out of buisness, thus lowering supply. There used to be several tomato packing houses in Homestead, but do to NAFTA and Mexican growers "dumping" cheap un-inspected tomatoes on an open market there is only one left. The only way to fix this would be to level the playing feild and make Mexican tomatoes and any other vegetable coming across the border face the same regulations and inspections US growers face.

Yes JB, your conscience here. Remember I told you not to make an idiot of yourself in public. You know that all imported produce must meet the exact same standard as domestic goods. No " banned pesticides" on Mexican tomatoes US consumers ask for. Remember I told you to tell the truth, that import product is nine times more likely to be inspected by the FDA. The truth is that Florida growers are the ones with much less surveillance.