Anti-CAFTA group prepares for ag secretary

FARGO - Opponents of CAFTA - the Central American Free Trade Agreement - will be "respectful of the secretary and of the office," but frank on their criticisms of trade agreements when Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns comes to town today.

North Dakota Agriculture Commissioner Roger Johnson headlined a group of agricultural leaders in an anti-CAFTA news conference in Fargo on Wednesday.

"Let there be no doubt when (Johanns) is here, that the people of North Dakota, through their legislators, are unanimously saying we disagree," Johnson said. "We've looked at this deal. We've determined the costs far outweigh the benefits of this deal."

Johanns will be hosted by Gov. John Hoeven, a Republican who has withheld support for CAFTA and who is a "very good supporter" of the sugar industry, said Steve Williams, of Fisher, Minn., president of the Red River Valley Sugarbeet Growers Association. Williams spoke and introduced speakers, which also included Richard Schlosser of Edgeley, N.D., vice president of the North Dakota Farmers Union, and Terry Duppong, registered Angus cow-calf producer from Glen Ullin, N.D., and a member of the R-Calf group that favors labeling of foreign beef and preventing the early re-opening of the Canadian border.

Pro-CAFTA advocates, including Johanns, have called the deal one-sided in favor of the United States, because it reduces tariffs in the Central American countries while the tariffs already have been reduced here.

'Little to gain'

But Williams said a CAFTA report published in August by the International Trade Commission shows that promises made to farmers today are "wildly exaggerated." U.S. grain producers already supply 90 percent of the Central American grain imports, Williams said, so there is "little or nothing for us to gain."

According to the ITC, wheat producers have nothing to gain because they pay "virtually no tariff in Central America" already, he said.

Beef producers have little to gain because CAFTA grants immediate access only for prime cuts.

"On the flip side, sugar beet farmers like me, and sugar beet workers, like the 30,000 people employed by sugar in this region, can expect to suffer," Williams said. "These projections don't take into consideration the mountains of NAFTA sugar that will be shipped to America, or the sugar we can expect to import from other countries seeking CAFTA-like deals."

Johnson said about 13,000 North Dakota jobs depend on sugar. He said that while CAFTA allows in only 100,000 additional tons of sugar into the U.S. market, it will be looked at as a template for other countries that want free trade agreements. If a total of about 500,000 tons in new sugar is introduced into the United States, that hits the "tipping point" that will kill the U.S. industry.

Schlosser said passage of CAFTA not only would decimate the U.S. sugar industry, but increase production of wheat, corn and soybeans on those displaced acres.

Duppong said he's concerned that CAFTA will allow producers in Argentina to ship cattle into CAFTA countries, where they would be slaughtered and added to the imports under the agreement. Duppong said he's not a member of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, which is in favor of CAFTA.

Other developments

Also on Wednesday:

• Amy Klobuchar, the Hennepin County Attorney who announced Monday she's running for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Mark Dayton, D-Minn., said she is anti-CAFTA, in news conferences in Moorhead and elsewhere in the state. Klobuchar toured the American Crystal Sugar factory, and said she was most impressed by the unity among farmers, business people and workers. She praised Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minn., for his leadership in staving off the CAFTA attack. Clay County Attorney Lisa Borgen, whose husband is a former sugar beet producer, hosted an event for Klobuchar in Moorhead.

• A hearing in the House Ways and Means Committee was held on CAFTA, but Johnson said the issue won't come to a vote until the "instant the administration feels it's got it beat by one vote." Williams said the sugar industry will continue to "use its resources" to defeat CAFTA, but declined to be more specific.

Williams said safeguard provisions for sugar within the CAFTA agreement "have no teeth to them." He declined to say whether the sugar industry will support CAFTA if sugar is withdrawn from the agreement.

• Tuesday, all six former U.S. Secretaries of Agriculture, including Democrats Dan Glickman, Mike Espy and Bob Bergland, came out in favor of CAFTA.

"A vote for CAFTA-DR is a vote for fairness and for reciprocal market access," they said in a letter, adding, "A vote against CAFTA-DR is a vote for one-way trade." Bergland is a former Seventh District congressman and is from Roseau, Minn.

Pomeroy, a member of the Ways and Means and Agriculture Committees, represents North Dakota in the House of Representatives. E-mail: Rep.Earl.Pomeroy@mail.houe.gov

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