Weekly Column by Congressman Doc Hastings - July 6, 2007Standing with Central Washington Asparagus Growers

Letter

Weekly Column by Congressman Doc Hastings - July 6, 2007Standing with Central Washington Asparagus Growers

Recognizing that opening up new export markets is critical to the future of Central Washington's economy, I have long been a supporter of fair trade agreements. When structured properly, trade agreements provide new opportunities for American farmers and benefit all involved.

The recently extended Andean Trade Preferences Act, however, is not a trade agreement. It's a one-sided giveaway that writes off the interests of American farmers under the false premise that South American drug lords are going to give up lucrative cocaine production if they simply had the opportunity to export legitimate products duty free into the United States. The Act is fundamentally unfair for American farmers and has had dramatic repercussions for our agriculture community - and for our local asparagus growers in particular.

The original idea may have been a noble one - but the Act has proven to be a failure and American asparagus growers have paid the price. In practice, the Andean Trade Preferences Act has resulted in higher South American drug production and a massive increase in duty-free imports of Peruvian asparagus. Since implementation of the Andean Trade Preferences Act in 1991, imports of Peruvian asparagus have increased more than 20 times over. These duty-free imports have decimated U.S. asparagus growers and closed domestic asparagus processing plants.

To make matters worse, the latest studies confirm that cocaine production in the Andean countries is actually higher today than when the Andean Trade Preferences Act was first adopted. In other words, we have exported jobs from rural America to these Andean countries and we are still seeing narcotics production go up.

Nevertheless, Congress just approved an 8-month extension of the Andean Trade Preferences Act. I was disappointed that the Speaker of the House bypassed normal procedures, and brought the extension to the floor of the House of Representatives with no opportunity to amend it. While I voted against this measure and urged my colleagues in Congress to do the same - the bill passed by a wide margin in the House of Representatives and it sailed through Senate, where no one opposed it or even called for a recorded vote.

In the months ahead, I will continue working with asparagus producers, U.S. trade officials and my congressional colleagues on ways to support the asparagus industry. In addition to efforts to level the international playing field for American asparagus growers, I will build upon previously successful efforts to secure funding for the development of automated harvesting technology to help the industry increase its competitiveness. And, 8-months from now, I hope that the Andean Trade Preferences Act can be improved so that our asparagus growers and processors can survive.

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