Trump's tariff threats against Canada squeezes Florida orange juice

Yahoo

06-02-2025

I understand why Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau felt the need to sound defiant after President Donald Trump's made trade war overtures against his country.
But Trudeau blundered by singling out Florida orange juice as part of Canada's battle plan response.
Trump announced sweeping 25 percent tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico last week. Then after the stock market reacted with a sharp decline, he backed off by announcing a one-month moratorium on his trade-war threats.
In the interim, Trudeau reacted to Trump's tariff threats by urging Canadians to boycott some U.S. products.
'There are many ways for you to do your part,' Trudeau announced to his Canadian audience. 'It might mean checking the labels at the supermarket and picking Canadian-made products.
'It may mean opting for Canadian rye over Kentucky bourbon or forgoing Florida orange juice, altogether,' he said.
Trudeau might have been better off taking his own advice about checking the labels at the supermarket. If so, he would have found out that so-called 'Florida orange juice' is a somewhat imaginary product.
These days, if you buy Florida orange juice, it is likely to be diluted with a mixture of juices from Mexico and or Brazil.
If a Canadian snowbird went to my Publix and made a point of boycotting 'Florida's Natural' brand orange juice, he or she may have missed a subtle change on the wording on the front of the carton.
Florida's Natural orange juice used to say '100 percent premium Florida orange juice' in big red letters in the front of the carton. But a little over two years ago, Florida Natural cartons switched to saying it was made from '100 percent premium orange juice.'
The word 'premium' was substituted for 'Florida' because the orange crops in Florida have been decimated. Mostly, this has been caused by lethal greening disease caused by the bacterial deposits of a tiny insect, the Asian citrus psyllid, that prevents the fruit from ripening and makes the oranges bitter and misshapen.
Florida's citrus industry used to have an annual output of about $9 billion at the turn of the century. But due to the invasive insect, the pressure to sell farm land to real estate developers, and the destructive vagaries of the hurricane season, Florida citrus farming has suffered mightily.
In the year 2000, Florida farms produced about 224 million boxes of oranges. The output last year was 15 million boxes.
About 90 percent of the oranges that are grown in Florida are used to make orange juice but there aren't enough Florida oranges around anymore to make enough pure Florida orange juice.
If you read the label on the back of a carton of Florida's Natural orange juice, it says it 'contains juice from Florida, Mexico and Brazil.'
It's similar in other big brands. Tropicana orange juice, with its manufacturing plant in Bradenton, says its juice comes from the 'U.S. and Brazil.'
Same thing goes for the brand Simply Orange. Publix Greenwise orange juice lists itself a 'product of Mexico.'
And even Indian River Select, a brand named after one of Florida's biggest citrus counties, lists itself as a 'product of US/Mex/Brazil.'
So, if we end up in a trade war, Canadians who follow Trudeau's advice to boycott Florida orange juice would be making a symbolic gesture of defiance. But like with tariffs themselves, it's action loaded with unintended consequences and collateral damage.
For starters, you're taking action on a product that, for the most part, doesn't really exist.
Making a statement about Florida orange juice means imposing artificial market forces on the Mexican farmers in Veracruz and Michoacan, where most of the Mexican orange crop comes from.
A Florida orange juice boycott would also affect the market for oranges in Brazil, which produces about a third of the world's citrus and is the leading producer in the world.
Citrus farmers in the Brazilian state of Sao Paolo have their own issues, without having to consider the boycotting of their product in Saskatoon.
Due to droughts and extreme high temperatures attributed to climate change, as well as lethal greening, Brazil is experiencing the smallest orange crop it has had in the last 36 years.
The orange juice business is already under siege without any tariff-related actions being launched.
So, yes, it's tempting to call for boycotts against bullies.
But this is a great example of how trying to put the squeeze on trading partners through the use of tariffs can lead to what might best be described as a circular firing squad.
Frank Cerabino is a news columnist with The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA Today Network.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Canada's Trudeau suggestion to boycott FL OJ is a blunder | Opinion