11-16 NWR More on Trade

This is your Northwest report for Wednesday, November 16, I'm David Sparks and both presidential candidates prior to the election vowed to kill the proposed transpacific partnership agreement time and time again to the angst of so many people in agriculture. Now that Mr. Trump is in, agri-pulse.com tells us that the US Grains Council says that they are already in contact with concerned foreign grain buyers. US Grains Council president and CEO Tom Sleight is trying to reassure customers that things have not changed dramatically. "Since the election I have gotten quite a few emails from different places, weird places around the world about ' what does this mean?' I think a lot of people need to be reassured, and we did that, that there really is no change in terms of US agriculture. We are committed to supply their needs for food and fuel way into the future. So an aggressive stance that way but I think they are just asking questions. The most interesting came from Japan because they had a lot riding on TPP in terms of internal changes to their own economy."

in related news, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced yesterday that the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) is awarding $200 million to more than 70 U.S. agricultural organizations to help expand export markets for U.S. farm and food products through the Market Access Program (MAP) and the Foreign Market Development (FMD) Program.