President Trump’s tariff policy has created confusion and retaliation from Canada.
And the nascent trade war may already be playing out on your breakfast table.
To learn about how tariffs could impact the maple products industry, WAMC's Lucas Willard spoke with Adam Wild, a specialist with the Cornell Maple Program and Director of Cornell University’s Uihlein Maple Research Forest in Lake Placid…
So, the maple industry has really expanded in the last 20 years, and even the last 10 years. So, it's actually quadrupled in size in the last 20 years or less. So, there's been a lot of growth in becoming more of a larger industry, besides people just tapping in their backyard. And so, when we look at the global maple syrup production, you know, it's predominantly in northeastern United States, northern Midwest United States, and then kind of southeastern Canada. And when we look at that total supply, 75% of the maple syrup production is being done within Canada. And of that, you know, 75% that's produced in Canada, a good majority of that is produce rate actually in Quebec. And in Quebec, they actually, because there's so much maple syrup there, they actually have a strategic reserve of maple syrup where they have in storage that helps kind of set the price and regulate the price and making sure that if we have a poor production year that there's maple syrup and supply that can kind of meet the demand. And then if there's a better year that they keep in a storage and the prices don't drop out completely. And so, because of that strategic reserve that kind of dictates some of the prices of syrup within the US a little bit as well. But when we look at that kind of global supply between maple syrup in the US and Canada, that there's…of the maple syrup that's produced in Canada, 60% or more is actually coming into the United States. And so, there's a large amount of maple syrup that's coming into the US that's being sold at grocery stores and places all across the United States. And so, the United States does that actually produce enough maple syrup to keep up with the demand of syrup within the US, and so that Quebec actually has more syrup and storage than what the US produces in a single year.
Now, how about processing and boiling sap? Do any US producers actually ship the raw product over the Canadian border so it can actually be turned from sap into syrup?
I'm not aware of anybody that's shipping raw sap from the US into Canada or vice versa for actually fully processing. I do know that there are some Canadian maple producers who own maple operations in northern Maine, that they have operations in Quebec and they also have operations in Maine. I believe most of those operations are actually boiling at both places. I could be wrong, but I believe they're boiling where they're producing and collecting the sap as well. So, from the processing side, not so much, but there is a lot of equipment that's being that's used for maple syrup production that's coming across the Canadian border, because a large majority of the maple syrup processing equipment is produced within Quebec. There is some equipment that's made within the United States, but a good majority of it is made in Quebec.
So how will these tariffs that…and counter tariffs that have been imposed by the US and then Canada affect the price of maple syrup? Can consumers effectively expect a 25% price jump?
I think it's very likely that we would see a 25% price jump in maple syrup sales, especially in retail grocery stores. If you go and buy directly from a producer here in New York, er probably won't see that although their prices are going to be going up, most likely because their equipment costs are going to be going up. Maple producers are usually pretty reluctant to raise their prices sometimes. So unfortunately, some of those will probably be absorbing some of those costs and operating at a little to no profit or potential loss. And so overall, there could certainly see upwards of close to a 25% increase in price, especially on the grocery store kind of prices of maple syrup that…because a lot of that syrup is coming out of Quebec, it's also coming from producers here, with the United States, though, that are these large packers that are buying it and selling to these different producers or different kind of retail stores. And I know that those packers and buyers are operating at very thin margins already, and so I don't foresee them absorbing that cost. And so unfortunately, they're gonna have to raise their prices most likely.
There's already been talk about certain industries seeking carve outs from these tariffs. Is there any organized effort within the maple industry to seek an exemption?
the industry has been discussed. Seen things recently. I know they've the International Maple Syrup Institute work together that's producers and equipment manufacturers and things like that. They're an organization, both in Canada and the United States, that work together on a lot of different issues, both on both sides of the borders, and they put together a letter to send to the federal government to kind of say how the tariffs will impact the industry. Where that goes, and whether they'll be able to get any kind of exemption, I don't know that they've really requested that full exemption at this point, but more just saying that the tariffs should not be implemented in the first place. That was, you know, a few weeks ago, before the tariffs fully came into place.
If we could zoom out from the trade part of the maple equation, Adam, how is this season actually looking? We're now in early March, and I'm sure that the sap is running.
Yeah, the sap is now running. Basically, really started most places last week a little bit, and then this week, certainly, with the warm weather, is kicking off. It's been a compared to, you know, the last few years. It's actually kind of a late start to the season, having a much colder winter than we've had the last few years. And so, we haven't really had any of those thaws in, you know, January or even February, that has kind of held off, and we're now seeing those thaws and starting to get SAP float, because we need the thawing weather for sap to be able to flow and so but, you know, is it too late? But if we look at, you know, what maple sugaring seasons were like 50 years ago, this is more kind of in line of where we used to be, and so we're not historically really late, but it is late for where it's been the last few years. The biggest concern is if we warm up too quickly that could make for a really short maple season, which would limit the number of days of sap flow and hurt the overall production. Because then we look at the actual number of days for maple sap flow, it's sometimes, you know, anywhere from maybe like 15 to 30 days of actual, real sap flow. And so, there's not a lot of days that we're talking about in the whole calendar year. And so, you know, if we lose, you know, even a week of sap flow days that can really impact total production. So, I know there's a lot of people that probably want it to warm up and start seeing flowers and leaves coming on the trees, but the best for maple production is to have a nice, gradual thaw out of winter into spring.
