China, Tariffs, Deglobalization - All Rolled up in Last Night’s Dinner

The news of the week included a trade war with China, tariffs, and a Tweeted presidential “order” for United States companies to get out of China.  Listening to the news, I’m standing in my kitchen with a bit of China in my hands – wild caught Alaskan Salmon, no less. 

Schwans Alaskan caught salmon

Our global economy is complex and driven by consumer goods.  You can find Stuff made in China everywhere you look and a person might buy enough to make their lives cluttered while taking a toll on the environment.  I’m curious what a tariff on China would do to the supply and cost of stuff that fills the shelves of dollar stores? Much of it is replaceable – in small towns through Minnesota you can find thrift shop storefronts filled with used items that could replace most everything you need from a dollar store or Walmart (and sometimes the used Stuff is more durable and higher quality than the new).  And little more use of things like real plates and less foam disposable plates would do the world a bit of good.   I’m grateful to take the 35 seconds to wash a few plates and eat off of a real plate than disposable – it feels respectful to the food and my family.  But I digress!!

 

Back to the salmon.  Between our farm and neighboring farms, I don’t buy meat from a store. We raise our own grassfed beef and free range chicken on our farm and I buy pork and lamb from neighboring farmers. Seafood is, obviously, one of the foods that we cannot grow or buy from neighbors out in the Tallgrass Prairie.  So I turn to my friendly Schwan’s person – a young woman of color – who comes to my farm every other week with her yellow truck.  That’s where I get my seafood – like the Salmon pictured above. 

What a trip that salmon has been on!!

The label says “WILD CAUGHT IN ALASKA, FILLETED AND PACKAGED IN CHINA  PRODUCT OF CHINA”

What is the impetus for having wild caught Alaskan salmon transported to China processed and then delivered to my farm in Big Stone County?  Why is it economically efficient for that salmon to travel that distance? What makes this supply chain profitable?

What makes this supply chain profitable?

• Outsourced Pollution:  Cooling, flash freezing, and maintaining the salmon in a deep freeze takes a lot of electricity.  Fewer environmental regulations, like air quality, keeps the cost of Chinese power lower, thereby saving money on electricity for an energy intensive food product.  Cheap, dirty power is readily available in China.
• Cheap labor: Please see the fine print on the label below. It says, “THIS PRODUCT HAS BEEN DEBONED BY SKILLED CRAFTSMEN.”

Are there no “SKILLED CRAFTSMEN” in Alaska?  What is the difference between a skilled craftsman in China vs Alaska.  I’m guessing the difference is: 1) the cost of labor 2) worker protection and 3) the resulting availability of labor.  If the wages and worker protection for salmon deboning “skilled craftsmen” had living wages in the US, I maintain that people would take those jobs.

It is our US need for cheap food that forces skilled jobs, like salmon deboning, to place where the workers have little choice or protection, i.e. China.  This is called global wage arbitrage – a situation whereby globalization has allowed corporations the world over to search out the absolute lowest wages and meanest working conditions on earth, for their and their shareowners profits.  My guess is that there is a fair amount of worker misery in every bite of my salmon.

So I find myself in the awkward position, as a farmer with many fellow farmers suffering from the tariffs, to wonder if the tariffs may have some benefit to workers in the United States.  Maybe Alaskans will get safe and well paying, skilled labor jobs deboning the salmon that is caught in their waters.  Maybe the environment will be a bit cleaner without the cheap, dirty power used to freeze the salmon and eliminated a global circumnavigation of the fish on my dinner plate last night.

So hang onto your hats folks.  What happens in de-globalization?  Your food will be more expensive, but maybe the global environment (think CO2) will improve and maybe US worker wages will improve, since they have been stagnant for 40 years.

Ok – Now I need to reconsider eating China imported salmon.