As part of the National Grain and Feed Association’s (NGFA) continuing efforts in strong support of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), NGFA members delivered more than 1,100 emails, tweets and phone calls to their members of Congress this month urging that they ratify the agreement when it is brought up for a vote.
NGFA members, who also visited more than 100 lawmakers on Capitol Hill in June to advocate for USMCA ratification, noted in their emails, phone calls and tweets that the trade agreement will preserve or expand upon critical market access for U.S. agricultural products in the North American market.
Over the last 25 years, U.S. food and agricultural exports to Canada and Mexico have more than quadrupled under USMCA’s predecessor – the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) – growing from $9 billion in 1993 to nearly $40 billion in 2018 and helping to support more than 900,000 American jobs in food and agriculture and related sectors of the U.S. economy. USMCA builds on the success of NAFTA and is projected to deliver an additional $2.2 billion in U.S. economic activity.
“USMCA further strengthens the marketability of U.S. food and agricultural trade by enhancing standards for biotechnology; reducing the use of trade-distorting policies; establishing modern, science-based sanitary and phytosanitary standards to facilitate trade flows; and improving grading standards and services,” NGFA members noted in their messages to lawmakers.
NGFA members also noted that prompt ratification of USMCA is an essential predicate to securing much-needed trade agreements with other major U.S. food and ag markets, including Japan and other Pacific Rim countries.
For more information about the USMCA and NGFA’s advocacy efforts, visit the NGFA website.
