Trade Deal Helps Mid Columbia Ag

Trade Deal Helps Mid Columbia Ag

Trade Deal Helps Mid Columbia Ag. I’m Greg Martin with Washington Ag Today.

One of the goals that came out of the recent Food and Beverage Retention and ExpansionOpportunities show in the Tri-Cities was the need to reach out to the Asian marketplace. Gary White Director, Business Retention & Expansion with the Tri-City Development Council or Tridec.

WHITE: To do that, to make that successful, we needed to find an Asian partner that we could work with that had similar goals and we reached out to the Hong Kong Trade Development Council and fortunately, Greg, they reached back.

White says the timing was just right with their new Strategic Gateway Concept.

WHITE: The Hong Kong Trade Development Council has launched what they’re calling the Pacific Bridge Initiative and the definition of that is basically to help U.S. companies get into China. So they’re trying to create opportunities for the world if the world wants to do business in China and throughout SE Asia, they want to make it so they will do that business through Hong Kong.

What does this mean for ag producers in the Mid Columbia?

WHITE: We’re looking at basically produce, processed foods and beverages and of course again beverages are predominately wine here. So they are really focused on the winery industry and the produce industry. And it’s an interesting face we’ve got a trade deficit with China in almost any category you can think of except for agriculture. We’ve got a trade surplus with China when it comes to agriculture. 24% of their food and beverage imports come from the United States. So we’ve got a tremendous situation here because we grow so much.

A signing ceremony will be held Aug. 7 at the Tri-Cities Business Center in Kennewick.

And that’s Washington Ag Today. I’m Greg Martin, thanks for listening on the Ag Information Network of the West.

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