The National Agricultural Council (CNA) will demand that the Ministry of Economy impose tariffs on imports of apples from the United States because producers of that country engage in dumping practices.
in June 2015, Mexico achieved a victory at the World Trade Organization (WTO), as they determined that the Cool labeling standards imposed by the US government to Mexican meat products were discriminatory to international trade.
In that sense, the president of the CNA, Benjamin Grayeb, stated that determination gave Mexico the right to impose retaliatory tariffs on products and that it was possible for them to apply this countervailing tariff on apple imports.
"We are in negotiations and we have asked the government to impose a tariff now. The Americans are not going to give in, they haven’t caved in regarding the Cool labelling of meat," he said.
"We have to be careful before imposing a sanction, we can’t impose it on a product that we import a lot. We must be really careful," he added.
It’s worth noting that the President of UNIFRUT, Ricardo Marquez, had denounced that certain US apple producers, who are up to 12 times larger than the Mexican producers, were using unfair practices such as selling at prices below production costs (dumping) to colluding with former officials of the Ministry of Economy and importers to then cooking the books regarding the product entering Mexico.
Since Chihuahua is the main apple producing state in the country, as it accounts for 80% of the total production, the impact that apple imports at dumping prices affects the whole chain and the National Treasury. "The impact is of 25% of income," he stated.
Source: Editorial Mexicoxport / with information from El Economista