Small Farmers Behind Possible Tariffs on China, Vietnam

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July 7, 2004 -- Score one for the small farmer. Yesterday, responding to a petition from a group of small shrimp farmers in eight states, the U.S. Commerce Department recommended new tariffs be imposed on six countries, including China and Vietnam, saying those countries were unfairly undercutting shrimp sellers here by creating excess supply.

The Southern Shrimp Alliance, which first filed the petition Dec. 31, claimed the foreign competition had slashed the value of shrimp in this country from $1.25 billion in 2000 to $560 million just two years later. The Commerce Department concluded that these pricing practices violated U.S. trade laws.

The shrimp farmers group claimed that loss of income had trickled down to processing plants, docks, suppliers, fishermen and farmers.

In addition to China and Vietnam, the shrimp farmers also named Thailand, Brazil, Ecuador and India. Proposed tariffs range from 8 percent to 267 percent.

The Southern Shrimp Alliance is also going after some of the industry's middlemen, claiming in a study released last week that even as the value of the U.S. shrimp supply has dropped by more than half, restaurants, for one, have raised menu prices for shrimp as much as 28 percent. The group said its data came from U.S. Census Bureau and Food Beat Inc. data.

The Commerce Department's proposal now goes back to the U.S. International Trade Commission, which ruled in February that the imports were negatively impacting the price of shrimp here. The ITC will make a final decision on that point before the Commerce Department may set specific penalties.