Manitoba Pork Sounds Alarm Over Trade Access Issues

The General Manager of Manitoba Pork is calling on the federal and provincial governments to work with the pork sector to create a strategy to address trade access issues. An article being circulated through Manitoba community newspapers and posted to the Manitoba Pork website looks back at 2024 and examines the anticipated challenges in 2025.

Cam Dahl, the General Manager of Manitoba Pork, says fueled by an uptick in the price of hogs, significant improvements in the price of isoweans and reduced costs for inputs such as feed, 2024 was a much better year than the two preceding years.

Quote-Cam Dahl-Manitoba Pork:

I think the economics in 2024 were really good and if nothing were to change in 2025, I would expect to see that continue. But, there's a lot of uncertainty out there and I expect when we talk this time next year that trade and protectionism are going to be unfortunately some of the key topics that we talk about.
There was the threat from the President Elect on putting tariffs in place on Canadian products but, even before then we were seeing things like country of origin labeling and proposition 12 in California and other states having similar laws.

We were seeing protectionism grow and now we're also seeing tensions with China start to rise over electric vehicles for example and agriculture is a target.
So, there's a lot of uncertainty in the trade world and Manitoba's hog industry depends on trade. 90 percent of the eight million pigs we raise every year are exported and so we're going to be paying a lot of attention to trade and protectionism in the coming year and that includes reaching out to our American partners and working together to keep the border open.

Dahl calls on pork producers to talk to their federal Members of Parliament and provincial Members of the Legislative Assembly to encourage the development of a response plan now. He suggests the integrated North American market benefits everyone and Canadian pork producers need to be more active in reaching out to their American counterparts.