Do not expect major changes to agricultural trade between Canada and the US if the North American Free Trade Agreement is successfully renegotiated says Abbotsford, BC, MP Ed 
Fast, the former Conservative Minister of International Trade.
Fast described his take on NAFTA and other trade agreements at a breakfast meeting of the Fraser Valley chapter of the Canadian Association of Farm Advisors breakfast meeting in early March.
“The only potential change I see (in NAFTA) is in supply management,” he told his audience.
Fast traced NAFTAS’s roots to former Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney’s decision to pursue a Free Trade Agreement with the US, Canada’s largest trading partner. That morphed into NAFTA after Mexico, Canada’s third largest trading partner, joined in. He noted that just as today, the original FTA and NAFTA negotiations were marked by controversy and demonstrations but ultimately proved beneficial for both the US and Canada.
He questions the need to renegotiate NAFTA, saying the now 25-year-old agreement has been good for Canada, tripling trade with the US since it came into being. He said it has been just as good for the US, strongly disputing US President Donald Trump’s claim that trade is tilted in favour of Canada.
“We’re at a trade deficit,” he noted, a fact verified by numerous US trade officials. However, he does not question Trump’s motivation in seeking a new deal, noting he won the presidency “by appealing to the basic instincts of people – telling them how bad trade was.” He says Trump “needs to deliver a complete revamp” since his bombastic statements have raised expectations in the US “unrealistically.”
He notes Trump’s carte blanche authority to conclude a NAFTA agreement ends in April and doubts whether it will be possible to meet that deadline “unless something changes politically in the US.”
If the deadline is not met or the US decides to scrap NAFTA, Fast admits it could cause “chaos” in the market but believes Canada would still be protected from unfair trade actions. He notes that in lieu of NAFTA, World Trade Organization rules would apply.
“The WTO keeps Trump from acting arbitrarily,” he said.
Fast was at the forefront of negotiations for both the Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement and the Trans Pacific Partnership (revised as the Comprehensive ant Progressive Trans Pacific Partnership or CP-TPP) and remains a strong proponent of both agreements.
He calls CP-TPP a great agreement for farmers who are exporters, saying it sets the rules for trade in the 21st Century. “It escapes my mind why Trump would pull out (of the TPP),” he said.
He believes the agreement is particularly good for hog producers who will now get preferential access to Asian markets, particularly the lucrative Japanese market, ahead of Americans.
“Canada is in the enviable position of being in the CP-TPP while the US is not.” •
— By David Schmidt
