President Trump announced his tariff plans this month, and the markets have responded negatively. Many ag groups are concerned, but NCBA and its Vice President of Governmental Affairs, Ethan Lane, are not. They are on board with what Trump is trying to accomplish. Oklahoma Farm Report’s Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster, Ron Hays, spoke with Lane to learn how tariffs may affect the beef industry.
“I think it is too early to really tell what the impact could be,” Lane cautiously stated. “The president is employing a strategy, here, using a tool that he believes in very much. It is something that he was completely clear about on the campaign trail and something he has been consistent about since the early eighties, quite frankly.”
President Trump’s strategy is to toss tariff numbers at countries that trade with the U.S. while letting them know that he is open to negotiations. Trump is a known negotiator and enjoys the process.
“We are going to be watching how those negotiations play out,” Lane said, and expressed pleasure at having been invited to the Rose Garden to be present for the announcement and discussions last week. “I was pleased to hear him talk during that announcement about the imbalance with beef specifically in Australia – the fact that they have enjoyed unrestricted access to our market for a very long time while throwing up a variety of non-tariff barriers to that reciprocal access, really gives us hope that perhaps he can use this tool to change some of those dynamics.”
Lane and his team at NCBA have been very clear with the president that they are not okay with upending existing positive trade relationships like the Japanese and South Korean markets.
“It is a tightrope, for sure, but he has some clear goals that he is trying to achieve. I think for right now, the strong support of the U.S. cattle industry is hoping he can make some progress here,” Lane added.
He reminded cattle producers that trade discussions are not about the beef industry. Although the beef industry can be a casualty of the discussions, the main focus is on other commodities.
“Trade is very infrequently just about one commodity,” Lane explained. “It is typically a much more complex landscape. Commodities come in each direction that very often don’t resemble each other. You may be talking intellectual property in one direction and a manufactured good in the other direction. Ag products one direction for inputs another way. There is always some sort of odd math that has to be done there to figure out what fair looks like when you aren’t trading apples for apples.”
Lane emphasized an open dialogue between NCBA and USTR, and the Trump administration. “They are aware that this is something they are asking farmers and ranchers around the country to buckle down for; that they know this isn’t going to be all sunshine and roses as we go through this process, but that the end result of that should be a better trading landscape for us,” Lane detailed.
Lane admitted that while the president did things in his first term that made the cattle industry nervous, he did the things he said he would do, which has developed a high degree of credibility for him with cattle producers.
“We have a history now, knowing that when he says he’s going to get us access or that he’s going to get us a better deal than we had before, he has delivered that,” Lane stated. “So, we are giving him our support and operating under the assumption that he is going to be able to do that again, being the negotiator that he is.”
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