Petitions to investigate trade policy infractions made to the U.S. International Trade Commission fell to five in November, with no anti-dumping or countervailing duty cases filed. The odd case out was a fact-finding investigation covering imports of strawberries and bell peppers at the request of the U.S. Trade Representative. The Intellectual Property infractions included RFID devices, diamond compacts and sponge/foam products as well as a four-wheel drive control systems filing, discussed in Panjiva's research of Nov. 24.
The strawberry and bell pepper investigation brings to light potential frictions in the USMCA trade agreement that replaced NAFTA earlier this year. The negotiations ended up with a deal that didn't allow for seasonal supply considerations in antidumping cases. The U.S. Trade Representative nonetheless outlined concerns raised by several industry groups around the ability of the U.S. ITC and Commerce Department to consider seasonal trends in dumping investigations.
The case is likely is a direct concern for Mexican produce producers, which Panjiva data shows accounted for 76.9% of U.S. imports of fresh strawberries and bell peppers in the first three quarters of 2020. On a seasonal basis, that's risen as high as 98.2% of imports in January 2018.
Canada, by contrast, shares much of the same growing season as the U.S., and thus shows imports that are counter-cyclical to Mexico, and represented 19.5% of U.S. imports in the same three quarters. Both Mexican and Canadian imports have increased in the third quarter as well, up 23.3% and 14.8% year over year, respectively, which may be causing additional concerns among U.S. producers for the winter peak.
Panjiva's data for Mexican exports to the U.S. shows that the seasonal surge may be arriving sooner than usual. U.S. recipients of Mexican strawberries and peppers include California Giant Inc. and Red Blossom Sales Inc., whose imports from Mexico have increased by 1756.6% and 74.8% year over year, respectively, in October.
On the shipper side, Panjiva data shows Driscoll's Inc. as one of the largest strawberry exporters to the U.S., accounting for $522.5 million in Mexican exports in 2019. Driscoll's exports to the U.S. increased by 118.0% year over year in October, providing more evidence of a possible shift in seasonality.
Eric Oak is a researcher at Panjiva, which is a business line of S&P Global Market Intelligence, a division of S&P Global Inc. This content does not constitute investment advice, and the views and opinions expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of S&P Global Market Intelligence. Links are current at the time of publication. S&P Global Market Intelligence is not responsible if those links are unavailable later.