Prominent trade disputes between Canada and the U.S. involve agriculture and forestry, with lack of transparency caused by Canadian non-market institutions a source of U.S. objections. Though there has been a recent flurry of activity in the binational dispute resolution panel on Canadian exports of wheat, one of every six panels since 1989 has involved softwood lumber. We examine lessons from the lumber dispute to shed light on U.S. objections to the Canadian Wheat Board (CWB). We argue that U.S. lumber lobbyists will continue to use perceived Canadian institutional obscurity to keep pressure on policymakers, while the CWB system enables similar agricultural interests in to agitate for trade sanctions. Traditional strategies such as dispute resolution boards, appeals to the WTO, and bilateral policy reform can only buy Canada time – new strategies are needed if Canada is to maintain sovereignty over its trade institutions.
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Paper provided by University of Victoria, Department of Economics, Resource Economics and Policy Analysis Research Group in its series Working Papers with number
2005-03.
Find related papers by JEL classification: Q17 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Agriculture in International Trade Q18 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Agricultural Policy; Food Policy Q23 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Forestry Q27 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Renewable Resources and Conservation: Issues in International Trade
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