A U.S. senator who advocates sugar reform is pressing the Department of Commerce to seek public feedback on any sugar trade deal it negotiates with Mexico in talks now under way.
Democrat Jeanne Shaheen raised concerns in a letter seen by Reuters that a controversial 2014 trade agreement for U.S. sugar imports from Mexico may be renegotiated without public comment from interested parties like sugar buyers and candy makers.
The Commerce Department and Mexican counterparts have begun talks to rework the deal, according to government and industry sources. The pact, which established quota and minimum prices for refined and raw sugar, was the outcome of a trade investigation that found Mexican millers were dumping cheap, subsidized sugar into the United States.
“Commerce is essentially re-writing agricultural policy outside of the Farm Bill,” Shaheen said in the letter to Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, referring to the five-year agricultural policy agreed on by Congress.
Source: www.vallartadaily.com