FAS advisor stresses FTA importance
The president plans a late fall push to begin moving long-delayed free trade agreements (FTAs) that “offer a lot of benefits and a lot of opportunities” for U.S. producers, according to a USDA trade specialist.

In November, President Obama is to travel to South Korea to iron out auto sector and other FTA challenges, before “getting it to Congress to be ratified,” USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) Senior Advisor Christine Turner related at Illinois Farm Bureau’s Commodities Conference.

Failure to move FTAs would enable competitors such as Canada to capture potential U.S. market share, she said.

“It’s critically important people like you are out there vocally talking about what this means to ag producers,” the Bloomington native told farmers. “Agriculture stands to gain so much from these free trade agreements.

“Definitely, in the Korea situation, it’s non-ag issues holding things up. It may be above my pay grade as to how they’re going to get this passed through Congress, but certainly picking up the phone and talking to your congressional members or others is always helpful.”

Turner noted South Korea and Colombia are “already in our top 11 markets,” the former ranking fifth with $4.4 billion in anticipated 2010 ag sales and Colombia 11th at a prospective $900 million in sales. But soybean exports to South Korea dropped 39 percent from 1999 to 2009, and Turner told FarmWeek the FTA could help growers regain market share.

Meanwhile, she said officials are “working tirelessly” to negotiate gains in Russian and Chinese trade. China is “the key driver for strong U.S. export recovery in 2010,” with a projected $14 billion in purchases tentatively powering it past Japan as a U.S. ag customer.

While China previously imported virtually no U.S. corn, it has since April bought a million metric tons, possibly in preference to shipping it from Northern China’s major grain area to Southern China’s livestock belt. Turner believes transportation upgrades within China’s interior may be contributing to a growing demand for corn from coastal ports.

A plan for implementing Obama’s National Export Initiative (aimed at doubling exports within five years) will consider containerized shipping resources, the condition of Midwest locks, and U.S. rail deficiencies Turner blames in part for market losses to Canada. Planned opening of a third lock at the Panama Canal in 2014 raises added concerns about U.S. ability to move goods out on larger “Panamax” vessels.

“Looking at our ports is certainly a huge factor, particularly for our ag exports,” Turner said.
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