The U.S.-Mexico Biotech Corn Dispute: A Fractured Fairy Tale
April 19, 2023 When I was a child, I remember all of the fairy tales I ever heard ending with the line: “They lived happily ever after.” But in the real world with U.S. biotech corn and Mexico, these words have yet to be spoken by the parties involved – and appear unlikely to be heard anytime soon.
By way of some background, Mexico first proposed banning the importation of U.S. biotech corn back in 2022. Initially, this ban was to go into effect in 2025, but Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has since decided to impose the ban earlier, at the start of 2023. This threatened to keep up to 17 million metric tons of U.S. corn from being shipped to the country’s key trading partner to the south. Such a ban would severely hurt some corn growing states, such as Illinois, which shipped an estimated 70% of its corn exports to Mexico during the 2021/22 growing season. Other states that ship large amounts of corn to the country include Louisiana, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and Missouri.
Loading ...Naturally, U.S. corn growers and their trade associations have complained this ban violates the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement (USMCA). Government officials of both countries have since engaged in a serious of talks to resolve this dispute, looking for the a “happily ever after.” These talks lasted until April 7, but no resolution was reached.
Next up, the U.S. is expected to take steps under the USMCA to file a formal challenge to the Mexican biotech corn ban, forming a special panel to consider the issues. Unfortunately, any decision from this panel could take up to 155 days to happen, easily pushing the entire matter well into December or January 2024 before some kind of ruling is made.
So, in this matter, it appears the search for the “they lived happily ever after” for all the parties involved will remain elusive.
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