Updated Aug. 13 — Canadian beef now has a more competitive rival in the Mexican meat market, with Mexico having ended 10 years of anti-dumping duties on U.S. beef as of Wednesday.
The Mexican ministry of the economy’s decision cancels all duties retroactive to April 29, meaning a number of companies bringing U.S. beef into Mexico can expect refunds.
The duties had ranged from about three to 29 cents (all figures US$) per pound, according to the U.S. National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) in a release Tuesday.
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The duties applied to about half of U.S. beef production, which steered some U.S. companies away from Mexico’s market, the NCBA said.
Mexico has remained the leading destination for U.S. beef exports, but in 2010 has been the only major market trailing the previous year’s results, U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) president Jim Peterson said in NCBA’s release.
Canada exported 44,867 tonnes of beef products to Mexico in 2009, according to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, compared to about 291,700 tonnes of U.S. beef and beef variety meat exports to Mexico that year, according to USMEF data.
Exports of U.S. beef products in 2009 dropped 27 per cent in volume and 35 per cent in value (to $909 million) compared to 2008 levels, according to USMEF.
The U.S. Trade Representative’s national trade estimate report on foreign trade barriers estimated the duties had caused losses of $100 million to $500 million per year due to reduced and altered beef traffic, NCBA said.
“In recent years, the interested parties in Mexico have concluded that the duties offer them no advantage,” USMEF regional director Chad Russell said in the NCBA release.
The association of Mexican cattle producers, the Confederacion Nacional de Ganaderos (CNOG), this year submitted a request for a review that could have seen the duties continued, but later withdrew it, NCBA said.
“Even before the withdrawal motion by CNOG, other Mexican industry associations had remained neutral or actually favoured eliminating the duties,” Russell said.
“Send a bill”
In its Beltway Beef blog, the NCBA on Tuesday left little doubt as to who it blamed for Mexico’s 1998 decision to impose the duties.
The blog cited NCBA chief economist Gregg Doud as saying Mexico’s decision that year had been a direct reaction to the move from R-CALF USA, a protectionist U.S. ranchers’ group, to pursue anti-dumping cases of its own against Mexican and Canadian feeder cattle.
“We told them not to do it. We told them Mexico would retaliate and win. They didn’t listen and it happened,” Doud was quoted as saying, adding that “this unfortunate 1998 debacle was imposed by a group in our very own industry.”
“Send a bill to R-CALF for $500 million a year for the next 10 years when you have time,” the blog said.
