“Strike while the iron is hot.” “Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.” “Being in the right place at the right time.”
These sayings have lasted for generations because they tend to reflect human experience.
Take that last one—in fact, take several of them. President Donald Trump hit the ground running in 2017 on a great tear to rebalance the trade relationships between America and the rest of the world.
He slipped in a new deal with South Korea really before anyone knew he was doing it. The last time we did a major deal with that country, labor unions and activists fomented such an uproar that thousands and thousands of demonstrators patrolled the streets protesting American beef, among other complaints. Our already strong recovery there has been strengthened by the new deal and our exports to South Korea have nearly caught up with our No. 1 export customer, Japan. People are actually standing in line for hours at times to get into Costco Korea, which has shifted in recent years to carrying 100 percent U.S. beef.
U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) CEO Dan Halstrom made it plain during meetings at the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) Midyear Meeting that the new deal with Japan was one of the biggest things to ever happen to U.S. exports. Lots of our young cattlemen today were not even born when we began negotiating for access to Japan’s market. Our success over 40 years has come despite a 38.5 percent tariff.
The Trump administration’s dogged persistence was helped, despite Trump’s dislike of multilateral trade deals, by the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP). Japan is a nation very dependent on trade. It needed to be a part of TPP. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his administration extracted tariff agreements never before gotten from Japan’s powerful agricultural interests by using that leverage to open up their agricultural markets and labyrinthine distribution system.
But personalities are important. Trump is a pusher. Abe was busy during his second stint as prime minister, trying to reform and re-awaken Japan’s moribund economy. No one before him had been able to get Japan’s economy going for decades.
Now, several of those aphorisms above are proving true. After eight years as prime minister, with lots yet to do, Abe is having to resign. Health problems he’s battled for years have made it impossible for him to continue. Had Trump and his administration not pushed to get a deal done last year, it might be that deal wouldn’t have happened for years.
Instead, a $2 billion market is growing, now that our beef has had a substantial drop in tariff and is on par tariff-wise with the TPP members like Australia and New Zealand. U.S. beef has already pulled ahead of Australia in market share in Japan.
One of Abe’s associates is favored to become the new prime minister but it is hard to say how hard he might push on trade and how whomever it is, that personality would mesh with Trump. And do not underestimate our good fortune in Trump being an advocate of American agriculture, of his paying more attention to us than any president in years, in his using us as a bargaining chip but not a long-term sacrificial lamb and recognizing the quality and production capability of American agriculture.
The public and behind-the-scenes pushing to get trade deals done by a presidential administration is critical to getting these deals done. Governments control access. Without access, marketers and products can be as brilliant as possible but nothing happens unless they can sell and ship. Gregg Doud will be able to write a great book when the Trump years are over—hopefully, about 2025—about the behind-the-scenes maneuvering that made things happen with Japan, with Mexico and Canada, with South Korea and other future deals giving high quality U.S. beef and variety meats access.
Another thing: Many exporting industries are hampered by the COVID-19 restrictions on travel. Salespeople can’t travel to other countries and demonstrate their products.
But USMEF’s structure and strategy, of having offices inside the countries and regions they are targeting and often hiring natives who already understand the culture and quickly grasp opportunities, is suited to this situation. They often can’t exhibit at big shows and gatherings but they are still in-country and able to adapt, invent new approaches and promote our product.
Trump, NCBA and the USMEF have made a great team. And the Beef Checkoff is critical to funding USMEF. Some $325/head derived from exports is not readily replaceable. — Steve Dittmer, WLJ columnist
(Steve Dittmer is the author of the Agribusiness Freedom Foundation newsletter.)
