Tag: trade policy

Dairy exports: opportunity in uncertainty

Posted on by Rachel Ravencraft

By Shawna Morris, Executive Vice President, Trade Policy & Global AffairsShawna Morris Headshot

The first 100 days of the second Trump administration have been rapid and unconventional on trade policy. Every U.S. dairy producer needs exports, and tariffs may bring new leverage to negotiate expanded U.S. dairy export market access opportunities. Yet, retaliation from China and Canada has weighed heavily on the short term, creating urgency for action to help offset the losses. The May 12 announcement of a preliminary deal between the United States and China to de-escalate tariffs is an important step in the right direction.

The National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) and the U.S. Dairy Export Council (USDEC) are working together to ensure U.S. dairy farmer priorities are front and center in the ongoing negotiations. Working closely with the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) and USDA, NMPF and USDEC’s joint trade policy team is leveraging its status as confidential trade advisers to advance new market access opportunities and ensure that barriers to dairy trade are prioritized.

This advocacy isn’t abstract. Preparing for President Trump’s April 2 rollout of a “Fair and Reciprocal Trade” plan, NMPF and USDEC developed a comprehensive road map for the U.S. government aimed at unlocking new dairy market opportunities. NMPF’s trade advocacy has focused on four areas: securing new market access, eliminating nontariff trade barriers, resetting the imbalanced U.S.-European Union (EU) trade relationship, and quickly resolving tariff retaliation by China and Canada.

Securing new market access is essential for ensuring the long-term growth and competitiveness of U.S. dairy exports. NMPF is prioritizing engagement with markets including Vietnam, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, and others where U.S. exporters face tariff disadvantages relative to competitors from the EU, New Zealand, or both. Ahead of the administration’s “Fair and Reciprocal Trade” rollout, NMPF submitted 45 pages of comments detailing the specific dairy products and markets where exporters would stand to gain the most.

NMPF has identified a long list of nontariff measures that also hamper trade, including unscientific certification requirements, monopolization of common cheese names like “Parmesan” and “Feta,” and lengthy manufacturing facility approval processes that are thinly veiled attempts to block trade. Tariffs become a secondary issue when U.S. dairy plants and products can take years to be approved to even reach a market in the first place. These challenges aren’t just bureaucratic red tape — they directly determine whether U.S. dairy products can compete globally.

The most egregious example is the EU’s use of nontariff barriers, which has driven the nearly $3 billion U.S.-EU dairy trade deficit. The EU has long employed tariff and nontariff measures to block U.S. dairy imports while enjoying relatively streamlined access into the United States for its own products, particularly cheese and butter. Contrary to what the Europeans claim, this blatant protectionism has nothing to do with history, pricing, or quality advantages — it is completely political. NMPF urges the U.S. government to use all tools, including the tariff leverage, to rebalance the deeply one-sided trade relationship.

Even in the face of retaliation against U.S. dairy producers, NMPF has pushed for strategic engagement to de-escalate conflicts and secure new opportunities for dairy. Both Canada and China, the United States’ second- and third-largest dairy export markets, respectively, have rolled back retaliatory measures in recent weeks, with China reducing retaliation from 125% to 135%, down to 10% to 20%, and Canada implementing an exemption process for dairy imports used as inputs for further processing.

This proactive approach is rooted in decades of experience. While the trade policy landscape continues to change day by day, NMPF is doggedly advocating for global trade opportunities that bring real, tangible results for U.S. dairy producers.

This column originally appeared in Hoard’s Dairyman Intel on May 19, 2025.

Port Labor Strife Resolution Welcomed

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

Following engagement from NMPF and USDEC with the Biden Administration and the then-incoming Trump team, the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) and United States Maritime Alliance reached a tentative six-year contract on Jan. 8 for the United States’ East and Gulf Coast ports, avoiding a damaging strike for dairy exporters.

While the agreement is still pending ILA ratification, the deal averted a strike that was authorized to begin on Jan. 15.

The agreement came after NMPF, USDEC, and more than 50 additional leading U.S. agriculture organizations sent letters to President Biden and then President-elect Trump on Dec. 19, calling for the federal government to help ensure a lasting resolution to the labor negotiations that had reached a stalemate.

In the letters, NMPF and the co-signers detailed the extensive damage that resulted from the previous strike, which lasted from Oct. 1-3. Initially, shipments were paused to prevent a backlog and then proceeded at a below average pace once the ILA agreed to extend their existing contract until Jan. 15, 2025. An estimated $13.5 million in U.S. dairy exports were affected, with members reporting cancelled sales and costly reroutes due to the disruptions.

NMPF engaged with USDA leading up to the contract deadline in January, sharing dairy exporter needs and urging the administration to avoid any potential port labor strikes.

NMPF Works to Mitigate Port Strike Disruptions

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

A port workers strike that threatened millions in U.S. dairy exports was successfully limited Oct. 4, after NMPF and the U.S. Dairy Export Council (USDEC) called on the Biden Administration to intervene in the port workers strike.

NMPF and USDEC in an Oct. 1 joint statement and Oct. 2 industry letter co-signed by more than 270  agricultural, manufacturing, retail and additional supply chain stakeholders helped apply pressure on the negotiating parties, who agreed to resume work on Oct. 4.

More than $4.5 million in U.S. dairy exports moved through east and gulf coast ports in 2023 and a work stoppage forced exporters to cancel shipments and undertake costly reroutes. NMPF and USDEC relayed information between exporters and USDA to highlight and address storage and rerouting challenges as a result of the strike.

The International Longshoremen’s Association reached a tentative agreement with the United States Maritime Alliance to suspend the strike and resume normal operations on Oct. 3. NMPF and USDEC welcomed the end to the strike and pressed both parties to come to a long-term agreement before the current contract extension expires on Jan. 15, 2025.

NMPF’s Morris Touts Dairy on Panel with Top Federal Ag Trade Officials

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

Shawna Morris, NMPF’s Senior Vice President of Trade Policy, moderated a July 12 trade policy panel with U.S. Chief Agricultural Negotiator Doug McKalip and USDA Under Secretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Affairs Alexis Taylor at the annual U.S. Agricultural Export Development Council conference in McLean, VA.

Morris underlined the importance of exports for the U.S. agricultural industry and highlighted the ways that the Biden Administration can work with the industry to make progress in opening new markets. Morris and Tony Rice, NMPF’s Trade Policy Manager, joined USDEC staff in a series of meetings with USDA Foreign Agricultural Service attachés during the conference to brief them on dairy trade issues specific to the attachés’ markets around the world.

NMPF and USDEC also organized a July 7 letter with 22 other leading agricultural organizations to U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai ahead of the July 9-15 Indo-Pacific Economic Framework negotiations. The letter points out American agriculture’s preference for resuming comprehensive trade negotiations, spells out the agricultural industry’s priorities for the negotiations including securing specific commitments on common name protections, burdensome facility listing and certification requirements, and sanitary and phytosanitary barriers to trade.