USDA Catfish Inspection Threatens to Raise Consumer Prices, Says Cato Analyst
U.S. consumers could face much higher prices for catfish in the near future if Congress permits the U.S. Department of Agriculture Catfish Inspection Program to remain law and lawmakers also provide funding for the initiative, said Bill Watson, a trade…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
policy analyst with the libertarian Cato Institute, in an Aug. 12 Cato podcast. Many lawmakers, industry representatives and foreign diplomats have recently decried the program as a protectionist non-tariff barrier aimed at safeguarding U.S. industry (see 13121124). The 2014 Farm Bill, however, kept the program in U.S. law (see 14020713). “We could see imported catfish excluded from the U.S. market for about five years until foreign producers can prove equivalence to these new U.S. standards,” said Watson. “Right now the U.S. imports at least 60 percent of the catfish that we consume, so the impact on U.S. prices could be significant.” Roughly 50 percent of U.S. catfish imports are from Vietnam, said Watson. The House abandoned consideration of agriculture appropriations legislation in June before it could vote on an amendment that would prohibit funding for the Catfish Inspection Program (see 14061220).