Each week, the editorial team at Greenhouse Grower and Meister Media Worldwide will bring you the latest updates from the Trump administration’s policies and their impact on floriculture, from labor to the farm bill to funding for anything from federal loans to research and Extension. We also want to hear from you. What questions do you have about immigration enforcement, tariffs, or other topics? Let us know, and we’ll do our best to get you answers.
Here’s our update for April 10.
Greenhouse Growers Address Tariff Concerns
An April 1 New York Times article outlined how some business are being affected by the Trump administration’s tariff policy uncertainties. One of the businesses featured was Bergen’s Greenhouses in Minnesota.
Every June, Bergen’s trucks in more than six million pounds of peat moss from Manitoba. Suppliers have stopped quoting prices until they have more clarity on tariffs. The plastic flower pots that Bergen imports from China could also wind up costing more if tariffs remain in place, squeezing already “razor-thin margins,” he said. He is also worried about needing to find workers if President Trump, as part of an immigration crackdown, ends a program that provides temporary visas to many of the company’s agricultural workers.
“We’re not putting our foot on the brake, but we are taking our foot off the gas,” says Bergen.
Meanwhile, Greenhouse Grower recently caught up with a grower in New England who told us (off the record) about he’s being affected by tariffs.
“We are trying to figure out if and how the tariffs being laid out right now will change how we do business. I got hit with my first tariff of $7,000 last week, and this morning I looked at what we typically display for Christmas and whether we’ll have to cut back. Figuring out how tariffs will affect our supply chain will be a big challenge, not just in price but in processing time at ports. It might have taken five days in the past to process a container in New York, but I can see it eventually taking 20 or 30 days, trying to figure out how much each tariff will add up to.
There’ also the uncertainty. Last week I was told our plastic won’t be affected, and this week I’m told that it will be. I’m not sure what the reality will be, but I’m planning as if my costs will go up.
One more comment: This week I brought in a tractor trailer of logs that I normally don’t do until September because our supplier said he had to start charging more soon, thanks to the tariffs.”
More Headlines
Why Trump’s New Tariffs Could Take a Bite Out of the U.S. Apple Industry (from GrowingProduce.com): Agriculture groups are coming to grips with the potential impacts new tariffs could have. In response to the latest tariffs announcement, U.S. Apple Association (USApple) President and CEO Jim Bair released a statement that can be found here.