Wisconsin cranberry growers among those voicing support for free trade amidst stalled NAFTA talks

Wisconsin’s cranberry growers are among those nervously watching as free trade talks among the U.S., Canada and Mexico get bogged down.

Tom Lochner represents the Wisconsin State Cranberry Growers Association, which has just joined a broad farming coalition pushing the Trump administration to maintain trade relationships with Canada and Mexico under NAFTA – a trade agreement that’s essential to his growers.

No free trade would be a really bad deal, according to Lochner.

“What happens, is you end up seeing trade barriers put up, you see tariffs put up, which doesn’t do anything to benefit people in either country, consumers or exporters or importers,” he said. “Much like the rest of agriculture, we rely, in the cranberry industry, on exports and free trade. And two of our biggest customers are in Canada and Mexico.”

Wisconsin is the perennial leader in cranberry production in the U.S. while Mexico and Canada are two of the largest cranberry export markets. Wisconsin’s cranberry crop during the past season was around six million barrels. That’s more than half the cranberries produced in the entire nation.

“We want to make sure that agriculture is treated fairly and that we have a trade agreement with our two neighboring trading partners that allows us to continue to sell our products overseas and in those countries.

As Wisconsin leads the nation in cranberry production, much of that comes in the bogs of Monroe County, where nearly a million barrels are produced.