03/12/08 Trucking Dispute

Trucking Dispute. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. The 18-wheeler has been keeping the ag industry moving for many years but now a dispute may cause the ag industry to lose as much as $2 billion dollars. At issue is whether or not Congress will halt or impede the Department of Transportations Cross Border Trucking Pilot Program. American Farm Bureau's Bob Stallman says that NAFTA has been a good thing for American ag. STALLMAN: International trade is extremely critical to U.S. agriculture. We export roughly 1 out of every 3 acres of production in this country. We can't eat enough in this country to consume everything producers can produce. What has occurred with NAFTA has been very positive for U.S. agriculture. Prior to NAFTA we exported roughly 3 to 4 billion dollars a year of agricultural products to Mexico. In 2007 that number has increased to 12.7 billion dollars worth of product. Stallman says that the number and variety of products exported to Mexico is very broad and any dispute would affect a great many ag producers. STALLMAN: What I want you to focus on is the fact that each one of these products has a producer that will be affected by retaliation if we do not move forward with this trucking project. We also have the entire line of jobs within the processing and distribution chain of these agricultural products where jobs will be affected. So this is about jobs. Ever since the NAFTA agreement was fully implemented in January, there have been numerous demonstrations in Mexico from producers that were not happy with the agreement. So far the Mexican government has remained firm. But Stallman cautions: STALLMAN: By us not honoring our agreement under NAFTA and allowing the trucking to move forward coming in from Mexico demonstrated by this pilot project that needs to move forward, we are sending the wrong message and we will be subject to roughly $2 billion dollars worth of retaliation if this pilot project does not move forward. Stallman chastised the administration saying that we need to honor our agreements or face the repercussions from other nations from our bad example. STALLMAN: We've made significant gains under NAFTA. The entire U.S. economy has gained significantly and efforts now to halt this particular piece of NAFTA in terms of the pilot trucking project would be a classic case of just cutting our nose off despite our face. We need to move forward with this project. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on this. My email address is gmartin@aginfo.net. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.