NC's agriculture industry braces for potential effects of tariffs
RALEIGH, N.C. (WTVD) -- Heavy rain coated Page Farms in Raleigh on Monday morning as Justin Page and his father, Danny, prepared for a busy season.
"Strawberries and pumpkins are the main things we raise," Justin Page said.
The family-run operation largely relies on local customers.
"Anybody and everybody from around here is welcome to come to the farm. We are a 95% you-pick operation where people come on, they go out with their families and pick their berries," said Page.
While the model does protect them from feeling the effects of retaliatory tariffs, some other farms are in a different situation. Zippy Duvall, President of the American Farm Bureau Federation wrote in part:
"More than 20% of farm income comes from exports, and farmers rely on imports for crucial supplies like fertilizer and specialized tools. Tariffs will drive up the cost of critical supplies, and retaliatory tariffs will make American-grown products more expensive globally. The combination not only threatens farmers' competitiveness in the short-term, but it may cause long-term damage by leading to losses in market share."
Page said they are affected by tariffs on imports.
"The price of the fertilizer is going up, chemical goes up, plants go up. A lot of people don't realize that your main strawberry plants and tips that you get are either coming out of California or Canada. If it comes out of Canada and there's a tariff with that, there will be a cost upgrade. Just like anything else with economics, as the producer has an increase in price, so does the customer. That's how it gets passed along," said Page.
Since they purchased their plants from Canada last year, he does not anticipate a major change in price for this season and added that despite short-term cost adjustments, he supports efforts to on-shore production.
"I think we need to bring back more development up here in the United States instead of shipping it off to other countries," said Page.
That was one of the points cited by the Trump Administration regarding support for tariffs, with the president further saying it would spur investment.
"If President Trump chooses to go forward with the tariffs, which I think is everybody's expectation at this point, there's really no way that they could go into place without raising consumer prices pretty much across the board," said Andrew Greenland, an Assistant Professor of Economics and Agriculture at NC State University.
He said products such as soy, tobacco, and hogs could be particularly affected if countries place retaliatory tariffs on the United States.
"Foreign countries, when they're choosing how to retaliate and respond to these tariffs, have historically been very strategic in their use of tariffs as a policy tool," Greenland explained.
How quickly consumers could see higher prices varies on the industry and whether any countries strike deals to waive or reduce rates.
"There are a lot of goods that we directly import from foreign economies. That might be things in the grocery store: fruits, vegetables, and the like. Construction materials, softwood coming out of Canada," said Greenland.
"There's no doubt we're going to face increased prices here. Farmers everywhere, consumers everywhere are going to be faced with increased prices," said Lisa Grele Barrie, the Executive Director of Raleigh City Farm.
Last year, the nonprofit grew 13,000 pounds of food.
"We're feeding for food-insecure people working with nonprofits. We want to grow culturally appropriate to create foods and foods that our end user want to eat," said Barrie.
It both donates produce and sells food at its pay-what-you-can stand; the average price was $3 a pound.
"Our mission is to connect and nourish our community through regenerative agriculture. We want to double down on making sure the food is affordable and accessible, so we're not going to be raising our prices," said Barrie.
As the Triangle grapples with food insecurity, Barrie said her team is ready to respond to growing needs.
"We've had a very generous base of support from the beginning. It starts on our Board of Directors and a lot of people have been very generous to support the farm. We launched a Future Farms plan last year because we expanded our lot here. We have plans to expand to a second location. We're going to announce that in July. We were trying to raise $200,000. We raised half of that in about six months, so that's a good sign of our donors' receptivity to Raleigh City Farm and of their recognition that supporting local farms, that not just that feed people and connect the community through all the engagement that we do is a worthwhile investment," said Barrie.
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are considering a measure that would rein in the President's authority to unilaterally enact tariffs. So far, seven Republican Senators, including North Carolina's Thom Tillis, have co-sponsored the legislation, which the White House said Trump would veto should it ultimately land on his desk.
ABC11 reached out to the North Carolina Department of Agriculture to learn about the effect of tariffs on the state's industry. A spokesperson did not respond to our interview request.
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