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Perdue says Class 7 has to go in any Canadian trade deal

The Secretary of Agriculture says any trade agreement between the U.S. and Canada will have to address dairy market access and Canada’s Class 7 pricing.  Sonny Perdue told C-SPAN, “Class 7 has to go.  It can’t be renamed something.  It can’t be called something else.  It’s just if they want to manage the supply, we’re simply saying manage your supply for your dairy industry and let’s be done with it.”

Perdue says he has talked with Canadian officials who say Canada should make some concessions, understanding their system is fundamentally unfair.  “They’ve taken a supply management, a quota system that pays their dairy farmers very, very well at the expense of Canadian consumers, and that’s their business if they want to do that, but they cannot use that and blend that high price – low price to undercut our producers internationally.”

Trade talks ended Friday with no breakthroughs announced.  Perdue says U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer was flying to Europe for trade talks over the weekend.  Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland left Washington Friday and told reporters high-level discussions will likely be held again later this week.