2018 Spring Farm

2018 Logan County Farm Outlook Magazine LINCOLN DAILY NEWS March 22, 2018 Page 13 S ince taking office, and before, President Donald Trump has said that he would revisit foreign trade including the North American Free Trade Agreement, a three- party agreement between Canada, Mexico, and the United States. In recent days, Trump’s desire to remodel the program has merged into occasional threats to do away with it all together, if it isn’t tailored to his liking. In December, Illinois Farm Bureau President Richard Guebert discussed NAFTA in his presidential address. He noted that the desire to update the current agreement was “understandable and commendable,” but said, “Complete withdrawal from NAFTA would decimate Illinois farmers as well as rural America.” The NAFTA agreement of today originated in 1994, and was put into place gradually over the next 14 years. In 2008, the plan was considered to be fully implemented, and its design was intended to benefit the U.S. and Canada, but to also improve the economic status in Mexico. The theory, according to an article published on the Council on Foreign Relations website by James McBride and Mohammed Aly Sergie, the agreement was to improve the economy in Mexico, provide new job opportunities in that country, and thus reduce the number of Mexican citizens immigrating into the United States. This was to be accomplished by implementing free trade between the three countries without tariffs, which would increase Mexico’s manufacturing industry and make their exports more competitive in the marketplace. However, opponents of NAFTA argue that the impact was just the opposite. Because the agreement lifted tariffs on imports into Mexico, the United Sates had a new customer Is a re-designed NAFTA an exercise in futility, or just a political pawn? Continue 8