Trade Wars Are Hurting, Not Helping, American Farmers:

In the prairies of America, there was an overwhelming support for Donald Trump in the previous elections due to his, “Make America Great Again,” vision. However, the current conditions of the farming industry in America is nothing great, and indeed, encourages the recent decline in farming: which is largely attributed to trump. To put it simply, the American farming industry is not as great as it seems, and the blame can be placed on Trump.

While there are many different ways to measure the deterioration, one will definitely stand out. For many years, America imported foodstuff less in comparison to the exports. To rephrase the words of America’s renowned commodity trader, America was a superstore to the whole globe. However, this is not the case anymore.

America is expected to mark their third consecutive annual deficit in food trading for this year, with the figure standing at fifty billion dollars. If one looks, this is the most shocking occurrence that has come, especially considering the past seventy years. America has faced three deficits in a row since Dwight Eisenhower took a seat in the Whitehouse.

Trump is inclined to keep those agricultural defaults with his second term and trade wars will not help the American agricultural sector. It seems as if the White House ought to care, but does not. Each and every time the government decides to go along this route, the US agricultural share in the global market dwindles.

The United States traded in their ‘Crown’ of being the world’s largest exporter of wheat and soybeans for the position of ‘king’ in corn export which has now been dragged away by Brazil and Russia over the last ten years. For now, the only thing standing in the way of US corn exports is Argentina. The new policies of President Javier Milei threatens to change the situation to where the supplies will far exceed controls, diminishing the US position even further.

For decades, American diplomats could boast about their “agripower”, claiming US bountiful harvests were a source of soft power. Crops served as both food aid and a commercial export without control and could be supplied to nations from Japan to Egypt and even the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

The decay of the American agricultural industry is just one of many sections of the economy that has been continuously declining for a long period of time. In an attempt to change this, President George W. Bush enforced regulations that increased the use of corn in biofuel production. Bush managed to unite a group of right-leaning national security policy proponents dead set on decreasing America’s reliance on foreign oil, environmentally concerned citizens eager to promote greener energy, and ever-enthusiastic farmer lobbyists that were looking forward to spending taxpayer money on their interests. This was the last useful attempt to attempt to get American agriculture back on track.

Unless it has been the case during the range of the last Administration, the White House has being doing very little for middle America. Barak Obama and Joseph Biden’s presidency did not do an tremendous damage to the section, yet Trump’s policies combined with neglect led to increased damage. His initial trade war with China certainly did not help this. In response to the import taxes Trump placed on some goods coming from the US, China limited how many American food products they were importing. This is a big statement for a nation that has placed a lot of focus on curbing inflation and attempting to be more self-sufficient.

Now, he continues to do even more damage. Trump is engaged in a trade battle, one with China, the third largest consumer of American agricultural products, and another with Mexico and Canada, who in line are the first and second biggest buyers. Collectively, these three counties account for almost 50% of American food exports.

American farmers expect lower prices and reduced demand as long as the bad weather does not disrupt supply in other areas. The Bloomberg Commodity grain’s sub-index, which monitors the real-time prices of wheat, corn, and soybeans, is more than 50% lower than the peak it reached in 2022.

Matters are made worse, as the cost of fertilizer will increase due to Trump’s tariffs on Canada. The US imports over 80% of its potash, which is critical for crop growth, from Canada. Trump recently accepted the damages and reduced the tariff on Canadian potash to 10% from 25%, yet, the cost of the necessary inputs will still hurt the farming economy.

Prior to all the tariffs and counter tariffs disrupting the US Midwest, corn and soybean farmers were already predicted to suffer loses for the next three years, according to the University of Illinois in Urbana. Former trade wars have cost farmers $27 billion dollars, this number will be larger considering Beijing has already targeted food for retaliation. The American Farm Bureau Federation changed their political stance from supporting Trump to opposing him, stating, “For the third straight year, farmers are losing money on almost every major crop planted. Trump had also previously claimed that, “Adding even more costs and reducing markets for American agricultural goods could create an economic burden some farmers may not be able to bear.”

The Trump administration needs to read a report regarding the impact embargoes had while Nixon and Carter controlled America during the 70’s and 80’s. These lessons can be applied even today and would serve useful in planning for the future of farming.

The US is now regarded as an ‘unreliable’ world vendor of agricultural commodities. The report found that “the dominant nations who compete with the United States in the world grain and soybean markets increased their production and exports of these commodities in order to gain a larger portion of the world trade.” Meanwhile, the US government “absorbed costs to mitigate the negative consequences” in other words, the trade policies added more damage than benefit to the government. Rinse, wash, repeat.

The United States’ agricultural competitors, particularly Russia and Argentina, have further headroom for expansion — especially if aided by Chinese investments. Argentina is the one country to keep an eye out on. It has never before posed a danger to the US because its domestic politics, through substantial export levies on grains and oilseeds, prevented the full utilization of its farming potential. Ironically, Milei, a Trump ally and free-market politician, might be in a position to jumpstart Argentina.

Farmers in the USA have many foes, both foreign and domestic. In the end, however, the rural voters of the USA are receiving, unfortunately, what they wished for.