Growing Tomatoes in the Era of Free Trade
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- Published on Sunday, 14 February 2016 22:30
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin .... No. 1221 .... February 15, 2016
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Growing Tomatoes in the Era of Free Trade
John W. Warnock
Southwestern Ontario is the historic home of Canadian tomato growers. The bulk of the crop goes to processing, and since 1909 the dominant corporation had been H. J. Heinz, a food giant based in Pittsburgh. But in 2013 the Heinz Corporation was bought by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (26%) and 3G Capital (51%), based in Brazil. It was soon announced that they were planning to close their plant in Leamington. The story has been a snapshot of what has happened to the manufacturing industry in Ontario following the free trade agreements with the United States.
In 1988 Canadians were informed that their government, headed by Brian Mulroney, had been negotiating a free trade... agreement with the U.S. government. The push for this had come from organizations representing big business and finance on both sides of the border. The Action Canada Network was formed, representing many democratic organizations who opposed the free trade agreement with the United States. Along with many Canadian political economists, they warned that given the reality of Canada's branch-plant economy, any free trade agreement would likely lead to many plants closing and their operations moved back to the United States. But Canada's political leadership pushed through the "New Economic Constitution of North America," as U.S. President Ronald Reagan termed it. Over the next 25 years Ontario communities saw factory after factory shut down. The food industry was not immune to this development.
