California State Sen. Andreas Borgeas said he plans to continue supporting tariffs on garlic from China. | Twitter
A California state senator who chairs the California Senate Agriculture Committee plans to encourage prioritizing domestic garlic production considering that garlic from China accounts for over half of garlic imported to the U.S.
Sen. Andreas Borgeas (R- Fresno) formerly served as commissioner on the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission and has conducted PhD field research in and published extensively on China, his biography said.
The problem with reliance on Chinese garlic goes beyond the competition it gives U.S. farmers. Garlic from over 1 million farmers in China is grown and processed using pesticides and fertilizers without documentation or regulation, thus enabling China to produce massive quantities of garlic, Olam Spices said. The influx of Chinese grown garlic makes it harder for American garlic farmers to compete.
China accounted for 2% of garlic imports to the U.S. in the early 1990s, Spices Inc. said. By 2012, imported Chinese garlic accounted for approximately 66% of U.S. garlic.
“My home, Fresno County, produces over 70% of the garlic grown in the United States,” Borgeas told USDA Newswire. “We must prioritize domestic garlic production, and I plan to continue supporting tariffs on garlic from China.”
Some garlic growers in America think former President Trump’s tariffs on garlic from China helped them boost domestic garlic sales, Reuters reported in 2019.
“If these tariffs are discontinued, California would need strategic legal protections to remain competitive against imported garlic from China,” Borgeas said.
H.R. 4792 is a bill introduced in July 2021 by the Republican Study Committee that seeks “to counter the malign influence and theft perpetuated by the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP),” Congress.gov said.
Also known as the “Countering Communist China Act,” the bill focuses on implementing tougher laws, a July 2021 press release said. The bill “Bans the United Front Work Department—China’s political ops arm—from accessing U.S. financial institutions; Prohibits American companies that get federal subsidies to go and expand their business in China affiliate with businesses with ties to the Chinese military; Prohibits universities getting grant money from the National Science Foundation to work with entities with ties to the CCP; and Establishes new sanctions on Chinese companies that steal U.S. intellectual property, including prohibiting them from transacting again with a U.S. person."
Additionally, the bill “Requires a determination into whether China’s negligence and coverup of the COVID-19 virus would meet the criteria of negligently using a biological weapon; Creates new Select Committee inside Congress to investigate the COVID-19 coverup; Spends just $1 billion as compared to the $250 billion Senate bill.”
The “Countering Communist China Act” may help U.S. farmers against Chinese competition, Borgeas said. “…but we need to continue to work toward disallowing entities from non-market economies, like China, from purchasing ag land in California."
