BANGOR, Maine — Maine’s blueberry, potato, apple and seaweed producers are getting a break from the U.S. tariffs on Canada. Sen. Susan Collins announced Friday that nine categories of Canadian products those growers depend on will be exempted.
The exemptions came out of Collins’ repeated conversations with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and other senior administration officials. Ambassador Greer and Secretary Lutnick heard it from her more than once: she asked them directly for relief on products like these, and told them what the added costs were doing to Maine businesses and families.
Nine categories in all. The packaging comes first: corrugated paper or paperboard cartons and boxes; plastic boxes, cases, crates, and similar items; plastic packing bags and sacks. Refrigeration and freezing equipment made the list. So did agricultural cleaning, sorting, and grading machinery. The machinery categories run on from there — filling, sealing, closing, and labeling machinery, and packing and wrapping machinery. Non-adhesive plates, sheets, film, foil and strip are covered as well. Last on the list: seaweed and algae products for human consumption.
“Many of our farmers and growers rely on specialized equipment, packaging materials, and other products from Canada that are either unavailable from American suppliers or cannot be replaced without incurring significant expense,”
Wild blueberry growers in Maine use specialized harvesting boxes made in Canada, built to work with the processing equipment they already own. Potato and apple growers use the same kinds of Canadian packaging and machinery to harvest their crops and get them to market, the statement said. For some cardboard totes used across the farm industry, the American supplier has stopped production, leaving Canada as the only source.
For seaweed, the stakes are jobs. Dozens of Maine jobs in the growing seaweed business were at risk from the tariff on the Canadian product, according to the statement.
The new exemptions add to earlier ones Collins said she had secured for pulp, road salt and cement, which helped Maine towns and construction businesses. Canada has also exempted American seafood from its retaliatory tariffs, a break for Maine fisheries.
The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that the United States was expected to remove the 50% tariffs on some Canadian agricultural and forestry products in a proclamation as early as Friday, citing people familiar with the planned action. Reuters, reporting the Journal’s account, said the reductions could be offset by higher levies on other Canadian goods.
A White House official told the Journal that any tariff announcement would come from the administration itself and called preliminary reporting speculation. The U.S. trade representative’s office declined to comment to the Journal.
Collins, a Republican, said she would keep pressing administration officials for more relief and for a broader trade agreement with Canada, which she called the state’s neighbor, ally and largest trading partner.
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