Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., last week inserted language in a
fiscal 2011 transportation appropriations bill calling on the Obama
administration to come up with a plan by Oct. 1 to end Mexico’s
retaliatory tariffs on Washington agricultural products. That plan,
by necessity, would entail giving long-haul Mexican trucks full
access to U.S. highways, as required under the terms of the North
American Free Trade Agreement.
Murray and other members of the Washington congressional delegation
have been pushing the Obama administration to honor this NAFTA
obligation since early 2009, when the administration caved to the
Teamsters union and closed the southern border to long-haul Mexican
trucks. Washington growers were hard hit by the 20 percent tariffs
Mexico slapped on a wide range of U.S. agricultural products in
retaliation.
The damage those tariffs have inflected on potato growers has been
particularly severe. In the first 10 months, alone, Washington
suffered an estimated $14 million decline in frozen potatoes
exported to Mexico, according to the Tri-City Herald in Kennewick,
Wash. The state’s potato industry supports about 20,000 jobs.
Mexico is the No. 2 international export market for Washington
frozen potatoes.
There’s reason to worry that the damaging effect of this trade
dispute will outlive the punitive tariffs. Mexico now shops
elsewhere for many of the farm products it used to buy from
Washington growers. It’s buying most of its frozen potatoes from
Canada. Kevin McCullen of the Tri-City Herald reported last spring
that “agricultural leaders fear Washington spud growers could
permanently lose their share of the Mexican market and see job cuts
in some food processing and handling facilities.”
Protectionist trade policies invariably deliver more economic pain
than gain. The pain continues to worsen for as long as the barriers
to free trade remain in place. It’s past time that the Obama
administration brought an end to this damaging U.S.-Mexico trade
dispute. The administration must find the political courage to say
“no” to its union supporters and honor the nation’s treaty
obligations.
Mexican Long-haul trucks were supposed to have full access to U.S.
highways by 2000. It wasn’t until 2007 that the Bush administration
was able to overcome congressional opposition and launch a limited
cross-border trucking program. Significantly, that pilot program
served to debunk union arguments that Mexican trucks were unsafe.
Mexican trucks crossed into the United States more than 46,000
times without one significant incident before the Obama
administration shut the program down after 18 months.
Of course, safety was never what motivated union opponents of
cross-border Mexican trucking. Their sole motivation was a desire
to protect U.S. truckers against foreign competition. For
lawmakers, it was simply a matter of pandering to an influential
constituency. But the cost of that political calculation grows more
intolerable by the day. The administration should heed Murray’s
call to end this trade dispute.
– Longview Daily News
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