How Canada interacts with international trade partners will affect farmers.
Canada’s involvement in the CPTPP (Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership) will provide opportunities for pork, beef, wheat and barley growers. But the deal also came at the expense of dairy farmers and access to Canada’s supply-managed dairy industry.
Early in 2018, India, a key market for Canadian pulses, increased its import tariff on chickpeas from 44 per cent to 60 per cent.
Also in 2018, Italy, Canada’s top customer for durum exports, continued to reject the Canadian product due to its country-of-origin labelling put into force in 2017. And Italy’s national farm organization claimed that Canadian durum contains elevated levels of vomitoxin and glyphosate residue.