The U.S. government said Monday it is immediately placing a 17% duty on most fresh Mexican tomatoes after negotiations ended without an agreement to avert the tariff.
Proponents said the import tax will help rebuild the shrinking U.S. tomato industry and ensure that produce eaten in the U.S. is also grown there. Mexico currently supplies around 70% of the U.S. tomato market, up from 30% two decades ago, according to the Florida Tomato Exchange.
Robert Guenther, the trade group’s executive vice president, said the duty was “an enormous victory for American tomato farmers and American agriculture.”
But opponents said the import tax will make tomatoes more expensive for U.S. consumers.
Mexico’s Economic Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said the government would continue looking for a way to once again suspend the tariff, part of ongoing negotiations between the two trading partners. In a statement Monday, he wrote that the move would “only affect the pockets of American consumers.
“It’s unfair and against not only Mexican producers, but on the American industry. The ground that Mexican fresh tomatoes has gained in the U.S. is because of the quality of the product, not from unfair practices,” he wrote.
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