Good morning. I’m The Globe and Mail’s Agriculture reporter and over the past two months I have travelled from the potash mines of Saskatchewan to the cornfields of Illinois to hear what farmers, fishermen and all the people who play a role in getting our food to the table have to say about tariffs. I want to share what I’ve been told ahead of what U.S. President Donald Trump is calling “Liberation Day.” But first:
In the news
Media: Rogers Communications signs new 12-year deal for NHL broadcast rights in Canada.
Retail: Here’s why you won’t see that Chanel perfume discounted during the Hudson’s Bay liquidation.
Law: There’s uproar in the legal profession after the Advocates Society cancelled a speech by a prominent Syrian-Canadian speaker.
On our radar
- The consumer carbon tax ends today, announced by Mark Carney earlier last month.
- Data will be released on the performance of Canada’s manufacturing sector for the month of March.
- One study says tariffs will likely cause shortages of Canadian-made drugs in the U.S.
- Ahead of patio season, outdoor-furniture makers face a Made-in-USA obstacle.
- Tomorrow, U.S. tariffs are expected to be implemented country by country.
White potash is stored in a warehouse at Nutrien’s Cory Potash mine near Saskatoon. Feb 11, 2025.Matt Smith/The Globe and Mail
In focus
The big picture of Canadian agriculture
I have covered the fishermen who descended on the Boston seafood expo in search of new markets and profiled Quebec’s kings of pork as their fresh trade diversification strategy faced a trial by fire. We’ve touched on a North America-wide greenhouse operation, refrigerated chocolate snack bars made just outside Toronto, the golden crop of the Prairies (canola) and fish farms off the Atlantic coast.
Exhibitor chat with visitors at Seafood Expo North America in Boston, Massachusetts. Tuesday, March 18, 2025.Lucy Lu/The Globe and Mail
Something along the lines of “U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat of a 25-per-cent tariff on Canadian goods” has appeared in every article. The hope was to understand Canada’s vast and complex food supply chain and bear witness to this delicate system under siege.
The landscape was littered with facts and details that surprised and often impressed me. For example, a potash mine – one thousand metres below ground – is swelteringly hot, heated to 27 degrees by geothermal energy.
I also learned that Canada’s Atlantic fishermen harvest more than 160 different species and that the U.S. dairy industry depends on Canadian canola meal, a processing byproduct, to feed their cows.
Anthony Eliason, director of Sask Oil Seeds, walks to collect some sample seeds from storage at Golden Dee Farms in Saskatoon. Feb 13, 2025.Liam Richards/The Globe and Mail
But an alarming pattern also emerged across my reporting. At some point a source would hesitate, afraid that, by defying Trump’s policies, their business would face repercussions.
I found this in rural Illinois, where old-school conservatives told me they didn’t vote Republican in 2024.
I was there to trace the trade of Canadian potash, a fertilizer that is key to all major U.S. crops. Canada supplies 80 per cent of the country’s demand.
Trump is not good for farming, the farmers told me in hushed voices in the corners of coffee shops and diners. And then they told me I couldn’t print those words. We’re the quiet minority in rural Illinois, they said. If this gets out, we’ll lose business overnight.
Sarah Hastings stands in a tilled soybean field near the farm offices she owns with her husband, Brandon, in Saint Joseph, Ill., U.S., on February 26, 2025. The Hastings grow conventional corn and soybeans and own Hastings CCI Equipment, a company that designs, installs, and repairs grain storage systems. (Jamie Kelter Davis/The Globe and Mail)Jamie Kelter Davis/The Globe and Mail
I booked an interview with the head of the state arm of the most influential agricultural interest group in the country. The vast majority of U.S. farmers had faced years of straight losses, and few could afford a bump in the price of an essential input. The industry association cancelled the interview just hours before.
I also found it in Windsor. I’d travelled to the border to hear from the Southern Ontario greenhouse sector, a world-leading industry particularly vulnerable to tariffs. Around 80 per cent of its sales cross into the U.S., and yet no business wanted to go on the record.
I found this in livestock and grain, with some of the largest global companies refusing to comment on tariffs, thereby refusing to advocate for their own interests.
Olymel employees work at the Olymel-owned La Fernandière processing plant in Trois-Rivières. 08/04/2023Renaud Philippe/The Globe and Mail
Do not let me give you the wrong impression. Sources pulled through. Some were coaxed and finally gave in, and others came out of the gate swinging. And it was these people – from CEO to fisherman and farmer – who brought into focus this confusing and historic moment in time.
But on the eve of Round 2, I’m left wondering what lessons I have learned.
Regardless of what happens in the next 48 hours, some things hold true. Canada is an agricultural powerhouse, fuelled by a fertile land base that is the envy of much of the world.
I’ve also learned that free trade is imperative to affordable food, and I’ve seen major Canadian businesses at last contend with trade diversification – a sine qua non for a healthy agricultural industry.
Trump 2024 sign in Shelby County, Illinois, next to Interstate 57, February 26, 2025. Tytia Habing/The Globe and MailTytia Habing/The Globe and Mail
Moving into this next month, I will watch as the industry tries to get lean, mean and diversified, and I suspect the fiercely protected dairy supply management system will be more keenly scrutinized than at any other point in decades.
But the big takeaway from the past two months goes beyond agriculture and captures how concerning this moment is. When a source hesitates to speak because they fear retribution from the leader of the United States, it is a stark realization that things have changed – and it’s not just the food-supply chain that is under siege.
Charted
Meanwhile in America
World markets were already in a tailspin before this week got started, and many economists have warned that tariffs will hit the U.S. economy hard and cost American consumers dearly. Even more worrisome, a survey from the University of Michigan shows that consumers anticipate inflation will remain elevated in years to come.
Analysts at Goldman Sachs have raised the probability of a U.S. recession to 35 per cent from 20 per cent despite expecting more rate cuts by the Federal Reserve.
Bookmarked
On our reading list
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Morning markets update
Global stocks rose in the wake of Wall Street gains as markets awaited details of U.S. President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs. Wall Street futures pointed lower after some gains yesterday, while TSX futures were little changed.
Overseas, the pan-European STOXX 600 was up 0.85 per cent in morning trading. Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 0.65 per cent, Germany’s DAX advanced 1 per cent and France’s CAC 40 climbed 0.69 per cent.
In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei closed 0.02 per cent higher, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.38 per cent.
The Canadian dollar traded at 69.51 U.S. cents.