Trade

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The U.S. shipped 353,200 metric tons of sorghum – roughly 14 million bushels - to China from March 5-11, an extraordinarily high amount that helped push prices to $5 per bushel, according to the latest USDA trade data and an analysis by the National Sorghum Producers.

U.S. farm groups are concerned about the increasing agricultural trade troubles with Mexico and Canada despite the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement and Biden administration officials are stressing that resolving those issues is a priority.

If approved by the Surface Transportation Board, the transaction would create the first rail network linking the U.S., Mexico, and Canada.

China is on a corn-buying spree. USDA has announced large daily export sales for the 2020-21 marketing year on four of the five days this week, culminating with a sale of 800,000 metric tons to Chinese buyers on Friday.

U.S. beef exports to Japan have been so strong that they set off a “safeguard trigger” designed to protect domestic producers by increasing the country’s tariff level.

The Senate easily confirmed Katherine Tai to be President Joe Biden’s U.S. Trade Representative with a bipartisan 98-0 vote Wednesday.

U.S. dairy farmers and exporters are offering a united front against the latest trade threat out of Mexico – proposed new standards that could make it more difficult, and a lot more expensive, to ship hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of cheese south of the border every year.

The USDA announced Tuesday a large export grain sale of 1.156 million metric tons of U.S. corn to China for delivery in the 2020-21 marketing year, showing that the massive Chinese demand so far in the 2020-21 marketing year continues to be robust.

The Senate is set to OK President Joe Biden’s nominees for Interior secretary and U.S. Trade Representative this week, while the House looks to jump-start a congressional debate over immigration reform and farm labor.

The U.S. International Trade Commission ruled Thursday that U.S. phosphate fertilizer companies are “materially injured” by imports from Morocco and Russia, a decision that assures the Commerce Department will begin levying steep duties.