Why Florida Farmers Want to Kill Nafta

Duette, Fla., a tiny farm town about 50 miles east of St. Petersburg, averages about 52 inches of annual rainfall. This year it’s ahead of schedule, with 63 inches since June, when the rainy season began. For Gary Reeder and other tomato farmers, that’s slowed down everything and threatened their ability to bring the harvest in on time. “We’re way behind on spraying. We’re behind on everything,” Reeder says as his F-150 pickup churns through ankle-deep mud. But too much rain isn’t Reeder’s biggest worry—it’s Mexico. “We can handle the weather,” he says. “It’s harder to beat unfair competition.”

As U.S. trade representatives sit down with their Canadian and Mexican counterparts to renegotiate Nafta, fruit and vegetable farmers in the Southeast have emerged as a staunch component of the anti-free-trade movement. That’s put them at odds with much of the U.S. agriculture industry, which has long been one of the biggest advocates—and beneficiaries—of Nafta. Since 1994, the year the agreement went into effect, exports of staple crops such as corn, soybeans, and wheat have more than quadrupled.