The Chairman expects more

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- A bipartisan group of nearly one third of House Members sent a letter to President Obama late yesterday stating their concern over Japan's market access offer for U.S. agricultural exports in the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations.   

Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) and Ranking Member Charles Rangel (D-NY) were joined by other Members of the Ways and Means and Agriculture Committees in highlighting the significant gap between Japan's commitment to providing market access when the country became a TPP partner in 2011, and Japan's lack of progress on this commitment in the current negotiations.

Japan is seeking to exempt large sections of agricultural imports from tariff liberalization, including rice and several other sensitive commodity groups.  "If accepted, this unprecedented and objectionable offer would significantly limit access for U.S. farmers and ranchers to the Japanese market, and most likely, to other TPP countries as well," reads the letter.   

The letter concludes with a call for the President to pursue the TPP negotiations without countries that are unwilling to open markets in accordance with the high standards set when the original TPP countries launched negotiations.

"USA Rice appreciates and applauds the wide support in Congress for U.S. agriculture in TPP," said USA Rice COO Bob Cummings.  "The U.S. rice industry recognizes that rice is politically sensitive in Japan, but Japan's reported offer for U.S. rice fails to meet our pragmatic goal of a significant improvement in the quantity and quality of access for U.S. rice.  More work needs to be done and our hope is that this letter will help to focus the attention of negotiators."

Many rice-state Members are signatories including Rick Crawford and Tim Griffin from Arkansas; Devin Nunes, Mike Thompson, John Garamendi, and Doug LaMalfa from California; William Enyart of Illinois; Charles Boustany of Louisiana; Alan Nunnelee of Mississippi; Sam Graves, Vicky Hartzler, Jason Smith, and Ann Wagner from Missouri; and Texans Blake Farenthold, Randy Neugebauer, Ted Poe, and Henry Cuellar.

Japan is the second largest export destination for U.S. rice.  Exports in 2013 were just under 295,000 metric tons, valued at $204.2 million.  Japan traditionally imports medium and short grain varieties from California.

When prices are stable, put U.S.-grown rice on the table.

TAKORADI, GHANA -- Price volatility for U.S.-grown rice dominated discussions at a USA Rice Federation foodservice seminar here last week.  More than two hundred participants, drawn from major towns in the western and central regions of the country, took part in the one-day seminar to learn about the unique attributes of U.S.-grown rice as tasty, healthy, and nutritious, and were urged to use U.S. rice for their businesses.

Foodservice in Ghana accounts for approximately 64 percent of all rice use in the country and the commercial cooks attested to the uniqueness of U.S.-grown rice, however, many raised concerns about the daily increase in the price of the commodity.  They said rice from other sources has comparatively stable pricing, whereas U.S. rice is suffering from unprecedented price hikes on the Ghanaian market, thus compelling them to purchase rice from other origins.

Olam Ghana Limited, local importers of U.S. rice, partnered with USA Rice to organize the seminar and donated rice samples for the event, and assured participants that price cutbacks will occur as soon as Ghana's economic outlook changed for the better.

"Ghana is going through economic difficulties which have been aggravated by the removal of government subsidies on utilities, high tariffs on imports, escalating fuel costs, and a weakening local currency (cedi)," said USA Rice Regional Director Hartwig Schmidt.  "The cedi to U.S. dollar ratio now stands at nearly 4:1, making imports from the U.S. very expensive.  Inflation currently is at a ten-year high, about 15 percent.  At the same time last year, inflation was in the single digits, around 8.5 percent."

There have been virtual no sales of U.S. rice into Ghana in the first half of calendar year 2014 because of the price disparity.  Between 2010 and 2013, on average, Ghana imported a little less than 102,000 MT per year of U.S. rice valued at $58 million per year.  Schmidt is hopeful he will see sales resume in the second half of 2014 in conjunction with stabilizing prices and promotional activities being undertaken, including the foodservice seminar.

Contact:  Jim Guinn, (703) 236-1474