Canada may have worked out a 30-day trade war truce with the United States, but agribusiness operators across southwestern Ontario say the tariff threat will continue to cost them time and money.
Like the bees that help produce the mead he’s trying to sell to the U.S. market, Tom Heeman has been buzzing since U.S. President Donald Trump announced his plan to hit most Canadian imported goods with a hefty 25 per cent import tariff.
Heeman is the general manager of Heeman’s Cellar, which makes both mead and cider. It’s a much smaller and newer enterprise compared to Heeman’s well-established nursery business, but a venture Heeman is working hard to grow.
Trump’s move to set off a trade war with Canada in the first few weeks of his presidency has complicated those growth plans for Heeman.
“We’ve been trying to figure this out since the fall,” he said.
Trump’s 25 per cent import tariffs were due to take effect today. Instead, Canada was able to negotiate a 30-day pause on tariffs while both sides address border security and other issues.
While the reprieve from tariffs is welcome, Heeman said trying to grow a business amid all the uncertainty adds an unnecessary level of difficulty to building his business.
Heeman said he’s been working more than three years to build up a relationship with a U.S.-based distributor who has agreed to add Heeman’s mead to their product roster. Any tariff will cut into Heeman’s profits of course, but he’s willing to take the hit for now to grow the business and build new relationships with distributors.
“I spend a lot of time on the phone with our distributor just giving him confidence in our ability to maintain a normal flow of business,” said Heeman.
Fears of rising cost
It’s a similar situation for Sara Wood, whose family operates Beaumont Farms near Mitchell, Ont., where they raise broiler chickens for the domestic market and grow corn, wheat and beans as grain crops.
Woods said any U.S. tariffs — or counter tariffs added by Canada — would add to the operating cost of a farm that’s been in her family for four generations.
“We’re going to have problems with access to parts. A lot of our parts and equipment comes out of the United States,” she said. “There’s just so much uncertainty. The local consumer is going to see it at the grocery store in the cost of food.”
Pork farmer fears double tariffs
Pork farmer Teresa Van Raay worries about getting hit with double tariffs. That’s because her pigs are raised on her farm near Grand Bend, Ont., then sent over the border to Coldwater, Mich., for processing. Some of that packaged meat then crosses the border again for the Canadian market.
She said it’s impossible to properly plan for expenses and revenue with the threat of tariffs hanging over her farm.
“The uncertainty is crazy,” she said. “How can you project what’s going to happen? It gets a little nerve-wracking really.”
Van Raay said regardless of what happens with tariffs, the trade war has illustrated for her importance of Canada developing a more tariff-proof industry. As one example, she’d like to see more meat processing capacity in Ontario. She said the investment will be expensive but also worth the cost as the U.S. becomes more aggressive on trade relations.
“Local food to me is Canadian and the more we can sell as a finished product, the better it is for us,” she said. “It’s something we’ve been pushing for quite a few years.”