IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/worlde/v43y2020i4p1059-1075.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Political economy of the US–Mexican tomato trade agreement

Author

Listed:
  • Stephen Devadoss
  • Elijah Kosse

Abstract

We develop a political economy model to analyse the US–Mexican tomato trade agreement by treating the minimum import price as a negotiated settlement. We incorporate the special characteristics of the US–Mexican tomato dispute, namely trade among large countries, the role of competing fresh and processed tomato lobbies, quota revenues accruing to Mexican producers, bargaining for a minimum import price rather than a tariff, and the role of the Canadian tomato market. We show the importance of the size of the lobby group's supply, the weight elected officials' place on national welfare, and the elasticities of export supply and import demand in determining the optimal price wedge. For the United States, larger fresh tomato or cherry–grape tomato supply intensifies the degree of protection awarded to US growers, while US processors work to mitigate this effect. From Mexico's perspective, larger Mexican fresh or cherry–grape output induces a push towards free trade due to the agreement's depressing effect on Mexican prices, while Mexican processors and quota revenues exacerbate the price wedge.

Suggested Citation

  • Stephen Devadoss & Elijah Kosse, 2020. "Political economy of the US–Mexican tomato trade agreement," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(4), pages 1059-1075, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:worlde:v:43:y:2020:i:4:p:1059-1075
    DOI: 10.1111/twec.12940
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/twec.12940
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/twec.12940?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kishore Gawande & Usree Bandyopadhyay, 2000. "Is Protection for Sale? Evidence on the Grossman-Helpman Theory of Endogenous Protection," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(1), pages 139-152, February.
    2. Mirabelle Muûls & Dimitra Petropoulou, 2013. "A swing state theory of trade protection in the Electoral College," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 46(2), pages 705-724, May.
    3. Grossman, Gene M & Helpman, Elhanan, 1995. "Trade Wars and Trade Talks," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(4), pages 675-708, August.
    4. Grossman, Gene M & Helpman, Elhanan, 1994. "Protection for Sale," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(4), pages 833-850, September.
    5. Gunter, Lewell F. & Ames, Glenn C.W., 2001. "U.S. - Mexican Tomato Wars and the 1996 Antidumping Suspension Agreement," Farm and Business - The Journal of the Caribbean Agro-Economic Society, Caribbean Agro-Economic Society, vol. 4(2), pages 1-13, January.
    6. Rigoberto A. Lopez & Xenia Matschke, 2006. "Food Protection for Sale," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(3), pages 380-391, August.
    7. George J. Stigler, 1971. "The Theory of Economic Regulation," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 2(1), pages 3-21, Spring.
    8. Baylis, Katherine R., 2003. "Dispatches From The Tomato Wars: Spillover Effects Of Trade Barriers," Working Papers 15850, University of British Columbia, Food and Resource Economics.
    9. Girapunthong, Napaporn & VanSickle, John J. & Renwick, Alan W., 2003. "Price Asymmetry In The United States Fresh Tomato Market," Journal of Food Distribution Research, Food Distribution Research Society, vol. 34(3), pages 1-9, November.
    10. Harry G. Johnson, 1953. "Optimum Tariffs and Retaliation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 21(2), pages 142-153.
    11. Maggi, Giovanni & Rodriguez-Clare, Andres, 2000. "Import penetration and the politics of trade protection," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 287-304, August.
    12. Devashish Mitra, 2016. "Endogenous Lobby Formation and Endogenous Protection: A Long-Run Model of Trade Policy Determination," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: The Political Economy of Trade Policy Theory, Evidence and Applications, chapter 1, pages 3-21, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    13. Phillip McCalman, 2004. "Protection for Sale and Trade Liberalization: an Empirical Investigation," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(1), pages 81-94, February.
    14. Maury Bredahl & Andrew Schmitz & Jimmye S. Hillman, 1987. "Rent Seeking in International Trade: The Great Tomato War," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 69(1), pages 1-10.
    15. Kishore Gawande & Pravin Krishna & Michael J. Robbins, 2006. "Foreign Lobbies and U.S. Trade Policy," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 88(3), pages 563-571, August.
    16. Ramon Guajardo & Homero Elizondo, 2003. "North American tomato market: a spatial equilibrium perspective," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(3), pages 315-322.
    17. Anne O. Krueger, 1999. "Trade Creation and Trade Diversion Under NAFTA," NBER Working Papers 7429, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Matschke, Xenia, 2008. "Costly revenue-raising and the case for favoring import-competing industries," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(1), pages 143-157, January.
    2. Stephen Devadoss & Jeff Luckstead, 2020. "US–Brazilian cotton policies," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(8), pages 2222-2236, August.
    3. Giovanni Facchini & Johannes Van Biesebroeck & Gerald Willmann, 2006. "Protection for sale with imperfect rent capturing," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 39(3), pages 845-873, August.
    4. Dutt, Pushan & Mitra, Devashish, 2009. "Explaining Agricultural Distortion Patterns : The Roles of Ideology, Inequality, Lobbying and Public Finance," Agricultural Distortions Working Paper Series 50299, World Bank.
    5. Saha, Amrita, 2019. "Trade policy & lobbying effectiveness: Theory and evidence for India," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 165-192.
    6. Pokrivcak, Jan, 2007. "Economics and Political Economy of Regional Trade Agreements," Working Papers 7286, TRADEAG - Agricultural Trade Agreements.
    7. Kishore Gawande & Hui Li, 2006. "Trade Barriers as Bargaining Outcomes," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(4), pages 437-457, April.
    8. Olper, Alessandro, 2017. "The political economy of trade-related regulatory policy: environment and global value chain," Bio-based and Applied Economics Journal, Italian Association of Agricultural and Applied Economics (AIEAA), vol. 5(3), February.
    9. Willmann, Gerald, 2003. "Why Legislators are Protectionists: The Role of Majoritarian Voting in Setting Tariffs," Economics Working Papers 2003-10, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Department of Economics.
    10. Achim Voss & Mark Schopf, 2016. "Special Interest Politics: Contribution Schedules versus Nash Bargaining," Working Papers Dissertations 27, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.
    11. Conconi, P., 2000. "Green and Producer Lobbies: Enemies or Allies?," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 570, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    12. Graham Mallard, 2014. "Static Common Agency And Political Influence: An Evaluative Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(1), pages 17-35, February.
    13. By Kishore Gawande & Pravin Krishna & Marcelo Olarreaga, 2012. "Lobbying Competition Over Trade Policy," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 53(1), pages 115-132, February.
    14. Facchini, Giovanni & Willmann, Gerald, 2005. "The political economy of international factor mobility," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 201-219, September.
    15. kishore gawande & pravin krishna, 2005. "The Political Economy of Trade Policy: Empirical Approaches," International Trade 0503003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Pravin Krishna & Devashish Mitra, 2016. "Reciprocated unilateralism in trade policy," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: The Political Economy of Trade Policy Theory, Evidence and Applications, chapter 3, pages 37-63, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    17. Elena Paltseva, 2014. "Protection for Sale: The case of oligopolistic competition and interdependent sectors," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 47(4), pages 1195-1216, November.
    18. Kato, Hayato, 2015. "Lobbying and Tax Competition in an Agglomeration Economy: A Reverse Home Market Effect," CCES Discussion Paper Series 56, Center for Research on Contemporary Economic Systems, Graduate School of Economics, Hitotsubashi University.
    19. Cole, Matthew T. & Lake, James & Zissimos, Ben, 2021. "Contesting an international trade agreement," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    20. Gawande, Kishore & Krishna, Pravin & Olarreaga, Marcelo, 2009. "What Governments Maximize and Why: The View from Trade," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 63(3), pages 491-532, July.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:worlde:v:43:y:2020:i:4:p:1059-1075. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0378-5920 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.