Canada has manufacturers that the US doesn't (and won't for at least 5 years) and vice-versa.
The Quebec PM did say that if the dairy industry wasn't happy they wouldn't put US alcohol badk on the shelves, which would have effectively killed the whole thing.
While a factor I doubt this is the whole story though.
No story can be told in a HN comment. No story can be fully told in words.
However, having spent much of my existence around the Canadian diary industry it is clear that it has always been the biggest sticking point in US and Canada relations. Not just today, but that's been the case for my entire life.
It'd be like trying to convince the US to reduce their Corn cartel. Except the corn industry keeps prices low, paid for by the American tax payer and demand mandates, and the Dairy cartel keeps prices high so consumers pay for the lack of competition.
these have been points of contention since at least the 80s.
That’s not really true. The US has 5% of the quota, tarrif free. Which they don’t even fully use. But, to be sure, it does get used. You absolutely can buy American milk products in Canada.
The problem is that they have to go through the processors to satisfy the processors' own quotas so by and large the meager 5% isn’t worth the operational complexity vs just buying milk locally for the processors. The US wants to be able to go directly to the grocery stores.
I mean, what were you expecting? Like before, they only have access to 5% of the market tarrif-free, and, in practice, cannot even use all of that due to the practicalities of 5% not being all that operationally useful to the Canadian processors. The US hasn't been bemoaning these tariffs for longer than I've been alive (and I'm quite old by HN standards) because the market is flush with their goods...
> It's extremely hard to find non-Canadian liquid milk on Canadian store shelves.
Hard is a long way from never. Yes, the volume is negligible, but known to be non-zero. Although we'd really have to understand the makeup of the milk to know how common you consuming it is. If every jug has a tiny drop of US milk in it then the chances of you encountering US milk on store shelves is actually quite high. It is highly unlikely that any jug will be 100% US milk. It is not like anyone is going to take the time to painstakingly separate it into a separate tank before bottling. Milk is milk.
https://dairyfarmersofcanada.ca/en/canadian-goodness/blue-co...
what changes is parts that arent so visible - milk powders, sugars, proteins, etc, that are inputs into ultraprocessed foods like a cheezit
We now know that if we allow other countries to have undue leverage over us, they will eventually use it against us. Have to think long term here. What kind of Canada will my grandchildren inherit?
Isn't that already the practical reality when the USA has unfettered access to sell the food the animals eat in Canada? Having control over the milk supply doesn't offer much when you don't have any live cows in which to produce it with. I remember what Canadian dairy farms did during the US corn subsidy heyday (hint: they happily bought the corn that sold for less than it cost to produce). Canada is only fortunate that the US backed off on those subsidies a decade or so ago, but that could very easily reverse again, especially if there ever became motive to sink another country.
> We now know that if we allow other countries to have undue leverage over us, they will eventually use it against us.
Doesn't that make dairy an especially poor food to weather conflict as it is, generally, quite hard to keep from spoiling? Your case might be stronger if we were talking about wheat or something like that which can sit idly in bins for long periods of time, but there is no such protections on it or anything else other than poultry and eggs which are also hard to maintain.
I suppose that explains why Canadian's won't allow the staple foods to also be supply managed, only accepting it for luxury foods (and once tobacco) that wouldn't cause a crisis if they disappeared, but on that realization we're back to dairy being more like taxis than essential calories.
Most obviously Southern Ontario is living in a dreamland where inexplicably ICE autos remain a viable industry ad infinitum.
Some forced reality, by any means, will in the long run prove to be welcome.