WELLINGTON COUNTY – Local farmers are preparing for the fallout of a trade war with the United States.
Details change on a regular basis, with U.S. President Donald Trump first signing an executive order imposing 25 per cent tariffs on all Canadian exports on Feb. 1.
Then he delayed them, reimposed them on March 4 and again paused tariffs on March 6 for most Canadian exports until April 2.
On March 7, Trump threatened additional tariffs, including a 250% tax on Canadian dairy products.
Canada has responded with 25% retaliatory tariffs on $30 billion worth of American imports and is set to expand that to $155 billion worth of imports if the U.S. continues with its trade war against Canada.
The fallout for farmers is not yet clear, but Ontario Federation of Agriculture president Drew Spoelstra said there will be “severe negative consequences for farmers and consumers on both sides of the border.”
Ontario agri-food exports to the U.S. surpassed $21.5 billion in 2023, including $2.6 billion in vegetables, $270 million in poultry and eggs and $213 million in dairy products, according to data from Statistics Canada.
Agri-food imports from the U.S. into Ontario neared $23.5 billion in 2023, including $2.1 billion in vegetables, $841 million in poultry and eggs and $593 million in dairy products.
Wellington County is home to about 2,600 farmers, including 12% of Ontario’s dairy, cattle and milk production farmers, 10% of the province’s poultry and egg farmers, and 8% of its barley and hog farmers, according to the County of Wellington.
“We are so interconnected to the U.S. with our food system,” Wellington Federation of Agriculture president Barclay Nap told the Advertiser.
“The majority of Canadian barley, hogs and greenhouse vegetables go to the U.S.”
He added, “Everyone needs a farmer – three times a day. If this trade war continues, it’s really going to affect how people shop and how they consume.”
But the specifics are murky, Nap noted, as the situation is in constant flux.
“The big variables are how long is this going to be, and what else is going to change,” he said.
University of Guelph professor Dr. Mike von Massow said consumers likely won’t see substantial short-term changes, unless the Canadian dollar weakens, but effects will be felt within the farming sector.
Von Massow lives just outside Elora and studies food economics and the value of food chains.
He is particularly concerned about the impact of tariffs on pig farmers. Members of the Conestoga Meat Packers co-op shouldn’t see a big disruption, as most of their products go west or to South Asia, he noted, but the impact will be substantial for pig farmers outside of this group.
“We don’t have a significant (pork) processing capacity in this province,” said von Massow, so many Wellington County pigs are shipped to the U.S.
“The alternative is to ship west to Manitoba or Alberta,” he added, which will significantly increase shipping costs to transport live animals a longer distance.
Pig farmers will need to pick the “least bad” option, von Marrow said – either discounting pigs to absorb the tariffs paid by U.S. processors or paying increased trucking costs to ship pigs out west.
For dairy, beef, poultry and cash crop farmers, von Massow does not expect significant short-term impacts, as U.S. exports don’t make up a substantial portion of sales.
Some impact will be balanced by increasing trade within Canada, he said.
For example, while Canadian dairy products will be sold in the U.S., less U.S. dairy products will be sold in Canada, and Canadian companies will have more opportunities to sell here without U.S. goods filling the market.
But sometimes it’s not that simple, he noted.
For example, a lot of cheese is imported from the U.S., whereas a lot of skimmed milk is exported to the U.S., and it’s not going to be helpful to saturate the Canadian market with skimmed milk.
Preparing, building resiliency
Many farmers ordered seeds and fertilizer early this year in order to avoid paying Canadian tariffs on U.S. imports.
That includes Nap, who is a market gardener in Puslinch. He also bought fertilizers and other supplies early “because I was a little concerned.”
But there are other purchases that farmers can’t anticipate, Nap noted, such as machinery repairs – and a lot of tractors and parts are imported from the U.S.
If the tariffs and counter-tariffs are in place for the remainder of Trump’s presidency, “there would have to be some tough times and tough decisions,” Nap said.
“We (farmers) are resilient and we can pivot,” he said, but some amount of predictability is necessary in order to make sustainable investments in what to produce.
“That guy in Washington is making it hard for us to know how things are going to be. He could double things next week or drop things next week.”
John Veit of Wicked Welly Farm and Apiary has purchased his seed already too, though he buys Canadian seeds, so they’re not impacted by tariffs.
Veit’s farm includes a variety of small-scale sustainable agricultural endeavours following permaculture principles, such as raising chicken, turkey, lamb, pork and bees, producing maple syrup and growing organic vegetables on a 0.75-acre market garden.
“By the nature of our little business, kind of by design, we are insulated from some of these large-scale things like tariffs and trade wars,” Veit said.
Livestock manure is turned into compost to feed the gardens and vegetable garden waste is fed to the livestock, who are all raised outside on pasture.
“We don’t buy commercial fertilizer, herbicides or pesticides,” he added, and their energy consumption levels are low without large chicken or pig barns to heat.
“We don’t need to transport our goods,” he said, as the farm doesn’t sell items outside of farmers markets and its on-site farm store.
The small scale also gives the operation more flexibility with processing, Veit noted, and last year it sent six pigs to the U of G’s processing facility.
Veit is hopeful this puts his farm in a good position to “provide some stability for our community.
“People can pick up a CSA farm share from us and prepay for their fresh produce for the season, and not have to worry about what the price is that week in the grocery store,” he said.
Nap sells directly to customers too, and is also hopeful those sales will increase as people respond to the trade war with efforts to buy local.
But Nap said if the increase in sales is enough for him to increase production, he’d need to know that soon, as he’s already started tomato, kale and eggplant seedlings inside and other seeds will be going in the ground soon.
“If someone is coming to me in July and asking for more than what I have, it’s really hard for me to make changes then,” he said.
Increase local processing
Von Massow feels there’s not a lot that local farmers can do to prepare for short-term impacts of the tariff war.
But in the long run, increasing processing options such as a pork packing plant in Ontario would make a difference, as it’s easier to store and transport packaged pork than live pigs.
“It’s a lot easier to move pork around than to move pigs around – you can’t ship pigs to China cost effectively. It’s much easier to ship pork to China,” said von Massow.
“We are not going to snap our fingers and have a processing facility here. But a processing facility would make a substantial difference in increasing the resilience of the industry.”
Nap said limitations for processing impact many areas of Ontario farming.
“Farmers grow in raw product – before it can be eaten it has to be processed and packaged …” he said.
“We just don’t have that capacity because we’ve been so interconnected with the U.S. We mostly provide raw product, and the U.S. processes it and it mostly comes back here as a product.”
Wheat is shipped to the U.S. and returns as pasta, fresh cranberries are exported and then imported after canning, and a lot of Ontario beef is processed in Pennsylvania before returning to Canada, he said.
To reduce this reliance on the U.S. he said, “We could use some government and corporate investments for more processing and more storage up here.”
For Ontario to build resilience and become more self-sufficient in its food supply, farmers also “need more land [for the] growing population,” Nap said.
“Wellington County is in a good spot, but Ontario is losing 319 acres a day, according to the last Canadian census,” he noted.
“If we don’t have that land, that soil, it’s going to be really hard for Ontario to become self-sufficient.”
Eating local, seasonally
Resilience could also come through a shift in consumer habits.
“If we could eat more locally and eat more seasonally I think it would benefit the economy more and maybe it would help see us through however long this trade war is going to be,” Nap said.
“People can still buy oranges and carrots and lettuce from California and pay those retaliatory tariff fees,” Nap said, or “people could pivot in their eating habits.”
“I think that is going to be, for consumers, the most difficult part – changing some of their eating habits and eating more seasonably.”
Veit sees an opportunity for farmers to educate people about the seasonality of local fruits and vegetables and to help people grow their own food.
He also sees an opportunity for farmers to encourage people to shop locally.
“My hope is that the buy local, buy Canadian movement bolsters support for the small-scale community farm like ours and that in the uncertain environment we can provide healthy, fair priced products for our community,” said Veit.
There are a lot of small farms, distilleries and farmers’ markets in the area, “just people haven’t discovered them yet,” Nap added.
“The less kilometres the food has to travel, the better,” Veit said.
“It’s going to be lower cost and it’s going to be higher quality. And why not support your local community if you can?”
Nap encouraged farmers feeling the stress of the trade war to seek support offered through the OFA, the WFA and the provincial government.
“Mental health resources are there,” he said, adding people can access them through the OFA and WFA websites.
“I don’t want anyone to try to take on the stress by themselves.”
