America is the second largest agricultural trader in the world. It depends on outside countries for key food imports including over half its fruit and seafood. Now Trump is threatening tariffs on these countries which could drive prices up. Let's take a look at where America imports food from and what's at stake as tariffs go into effect.
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00:00America imports over $100 billion of food products a year,
00:06one of the highest totals in the world.
00:08That includes more than half of its fruit and seafood.
00:13President Donald Trump has threatened tariffs
00:15on some of the U.S.'s biggest food sources,
00:18which could affect tons of products Americans consume.
00:22Every day Americans are going to be the ones
00:24paying the prices of tariffs.
00:26So which countries feed America the most?
00:29And what's at stake if trading relations fizzle?
00:35About half of America's fruit and vegetable imports
00:37come from Mexico.
00:39And the U.S. put a 25% tariff on all these products.
00:44It's to protect domestic suppliers.
00:47Second, it's to incentivize foreign suppliers
00:51to make their products at a lower price
00:53so that they're competitive on the American market.
00:55And third, it's for political leverage.
00:58The U.S. gets about 90% of its avocados from Mexico,
01:01over $2 billion worth in 2024.
01:04In Mexico, they're so valuable
01:06that farmers have formed militias
01:08to protect farms from cartels.
01:11Thank you very much.
01:13It all started in 1993
01:15when the U.S. signed the North American Free Trade Agreement.
01:19I believe we have made a decision now
01:22that will permit us to create an economic order in the world
01:26that will promote more growth, more equality,
01:29better preservation of the environment,
01:31and a greater possibility of world peace.
01:34It lifted an 83-year ban on avocado imports from Mexico.
01:41Americans went from eating about a pound of avocados a year in 1994
01:45to more than seven pounds of avocados in 2018.
01:49Imports from Mexico exploded in this same time period.
01:56And the business is so lucrative
01:58that even the deadly violence hasn't stopped other newcomers
02:01from trying to break in,
02:03even though the best land is taken.
02:11Eduardo Montero and his partners are growing avocado trees
02:14on the side of a mountain that is rocky and exposed.
02:18Still, his family is well aware of how to deal with cartels.
02:34If Eduardo can make it work, though,
02:36a 76-acre farm like his could bring in more than $200,000
02:40in revenue at each harvest,
02:42with multiple harvests every year.
02:48And if the cartels charge him at local rates,
02:50he could probably expect to pay them about $68,000
02:54in what is called piso, or protection money.
02:57Meanwhile, the world's love affair with avocados
03:00is expected to keep on growing.
03:07More than 80% of the limes Americans consume come from Mexico.
03:11This farm in Veracruz can harvest 3,000 of them a day,
03:15despite droughts that have squeezed the industry.
03:18Once they're picked, workers load them onto trucks
03:21and bring them to the processing facility.
03:31Each one gets washed with a detergent disinfectant.
03:40And hit with a spray of palm wax.
03:44It's not just to make the limes look shiny.
03:58Throughout their journey in the factory,
04:00the limes will get sorted multiple times.
04:02Some stations do it by hand, others with fancy tech.
04:14Using those pictures, the machines separated them
04:17based on their size.
04:19Ones that aren't the right size will go directly
04:21to Mexico's juicing industry.
04:23The perfectly sized ones will head on to get exported.
04:26But first, there's quality control.
04:30After they pass this final test,
04:32the limes are ready for packaging and shipping.
04:35The majority of the limes produced in this region
04:37end up in the United States.
04:39Demand for limes has been increasing for decades,
04:42as Latin American and Asian cuisines became more popular.
04:45But in 1994, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic,
04:48the demand for limes skyrocketed,
04:50and the production of limes in the United States
04:52grew to more than 1,000 limes a day.
04:55Now, the U.S. is the biggest importer of limes globally,
04:58doubling the amount it purchased from Mexico
05:00in the last 10 years.
05:02To keep up with demand, Mexico increased its production
05:0550% in the same decade.
05:08Workers here say that demand is a double-edged sword.
05:11On one hand...
05:26The U.S. consumes more raw sugar than it can produce,
05:29and gets more from Mexico than from any other country.
05:33But in 2014, U.S. producers accused Mexico
05:37of dumping cheap sugar into the market,
05:40hurting America's multibillion-dollar industry.
05:43The U.S. government said,
05:45But in 2014, U.S. producers accused Mexico
05:48of dumping cheap sugar into the market,
05:51hurting America's multibillion-dollar industry.
05:54The U.S. government agreed,
05:56and started limiting Mexican imports the following year.
06:00In 2023, a U.S. government report said
06:03this helped U.S. sugar producers,
06:05but made sugar more expensive for Americans
06:08and hurt the economy.
06:10Trump has also threatened tariffs
06:12on European Union countries,
06:14which supply the U.S. with over $20 billion of food a year.
06:17One of our, in a lot of cases,
06:19our biggest allies and biggest trade partners.
06:22The European Union has already signaled
06:25that if Trump puts tariffs on those nations into effect,
06:29that they will retaliate and they will do a counter-tariff,
06:33which means that it will be more expensive
06:36to send European goods into the U.S.,
06:39and it will be more expensive to send American goods into Europe.
06:42It also damaged Trump's relationship
06:46with a lot of European and EU leaders.
06:50The U.S. imports more cheese from Italy
06:53than any other country,
06:55over $400 million worth a year.
06:57The region of Puglia is the birthplace of burrata cheese.
07:01In Italy, we met with Vincenzo Titrani,
07:04son, grandson, and great-grandson of cheese makers
07:07and owner of Mozzabella.
07:09His dairy produces about 500 kilos of fresh cheese every day.
07:40It's so creamy. It's incredible.
07:42You don't feel that there is, like, the small little pieces
07:45and the outside part, which is hard.
07:47It melts in your mouth.
07:49It's so creamy.
07:51It's so creamy.
07:53It's so creamy.
07:55It's so creamy.
07:57It's so creamy.
07:59It's so creamy.
08:01It's so creamy.
08:03It's so creamy.
08:05It's so creamy.
08:08That's so creamy.
08:12The U.S. imports nearly all of its olive oil,
08:15and most of it comes from Spain.
08:18Olive groves stretch across 6.8 million acres of Spain,
08:23making the country the largest exporter
08:25of extra virgin olive oil in the world.
08:28Olive oil production here
08:30dates back to the 2nd millennium BC.
08:32Andalusia once supplied olive oil for the Roman Empire,
08:36But in modern times, Spain hasn't always dominated the market, mainly because the bulk of what
08:41it used to produce was a low-quality blend.
08:44That changed about 25 years ago, when producers invested in new harvesting practices and machinery.
08:51That's what makes today's olive oil higher quality and much more expensive.
08:57Farmers unload their crops in processing facilities run by Deku, and a conveyor belt carries thousands
09:03of raw olives an hour.
09:07They're gently washed to remove any remaining dirt from the groves.
09:11But the value of their crop isn't set.
09:14The olives have to be taste-tested first.
09:17Extra-virgin olive oil is the least processed.
09:20It's extracted not through the use of heat or chemicals, but by grinding the olives and
09:25pressing out the oil.
09:26That's what makes extra-virgin the most expensive type of olive oil.
09:31But it's also considered healthier, because it retains all of its natural vitamins and
09:35antioxidants.
09:36First, machines blend the olives into a thick paste.
10:02Then, massive decanters extract the oil out of the mush.
10:06They also keep the olive waste, called alperujo.
10:10After it's composted, it's used as fertilizer or fuel.
10:16The new olive oil is stored in huge stainless steel tanks.
10:19Nitrogen fills the gap at the top of the canister to keep the oil fresh.
10:24It's kept in the dark at a constant temperature.
10:27CECOOP has the biggest olive oil storage facility in the world.
10:31It can hold 300,000 metric tons.
10:34That's one-third of an oil tanker.
10:37The tanks can keep oil fresh for up to two years.
10:42Each batch of olives has a distinct fragrance.
10:45Finally, the olive oil is poured into bottles and sealed.
11:04The U.S. gets roughly 75% of its truffle imports from Italy, home to some of the rarest and
11:09most expensive varieties in the world.
11:12We spent a day with a professional truffle hunter to see how he finds them in the wild.
11:17We're in the woods of Alba, Piedmont, Italy.
11:21You can find white truffles growing in this woods and this woods only.
11:26These trees, together with the right soil and weather conditions, can only be found
11:30in this region of Italy.
11:32Together they create this, a surprisingly big truffle, as you can see, but also one
11:37with a divine fragrance.
11:40Today, we're going to go hunt for more.
11:44To find these famous truffles, we must hunt them in the woods where they grow.
11:50And because truffles grow underground, unlike mushrooms, I needed to go on the hunt with
11:54licensed truffle hunter Gianni and his two dogs, Penny and Vito.
12:10She's a crossbreed, she's not a pure dog.
12:14She's a Bracco-Puente, crossbreed with the Beagle, because they're stronger and more powerful breeds.
12:20He's a pure breed dog.
12:22He's an excellent hunting dog, which is used here in these areas.
12:26He's the Italian Spinone.
12:28Because, anyway, there's a feeling between me and the dog.
12:32I now know the dog.
12:34Just the movements of the dog, how it moves, how the tail moves, I can identify,
12:39I can tell if it's looking for the truffle or if it's smelling the wild animal in the air.
12:45Dogs are the only ones that are actually allowed to dig into this soil.
12:49Tools like hoes and rakes are forbidden.
12:52If the soil is hard and the truffle is hidden deep down, a truffle hunter, or trifulao in
12:57the local dialect, is only allowed to use this small tool called zappino.
13:01We visited during a period of heavy drought, so truffles were mostly on the surface and
13:05there was no need to use it.
13:09Ah, here it is. What is this?
13:11This is a black one.
13:14It's the Scorzone.
13:16Take it, Penny.
13:18Daughter, come here.
13:21Where is it?
13:23What is it? What is it?
13:24Always a black one.
13:26Smell it.
13:29Roughly 80% of the seafood Americans eat is imported.
13:33Much of it comes from India.
13:35It's the top supplier of shrimp, exporting over $2 billion of it to the U.S. a year.
13:41But in January 2025, Trump threatened 100% tariffs on India and nine other countries
13:48he suspected were trying to replace the U.S. dollar as their reserve currency.
13:53Out of all the tariffs that Trump has suggested in his second term, the one on India is one
13:57of the steepest.
13:58The U.S. dollar is right now the main currency that is used by a lot of countries in terms
14:04of international trade.
14:06The world operates on a lot of different currencies.
14:08Think the dollar, yen, pounds.
14:11So one of the things that's really important to Trump is that right now the U.S. dollar
14:17is sort of the standard state of currency for international trade.
14:22Trump wants to impose tariffs.
14:24Not only will it be harder for Indian businesses to send their goods to the U.S.,
14:31it will be harder for American businesses to get the seafood and spices that they need
14:36for their products.
14:38But tariffs on Indian seafood could benefit American shrimpers, who have struggled to
14:42compete with cheaper imports.
14:44Shrimpers like Captain Lonnie Mayhew Jr. are facing skyrocketing costs of operating a boat.
14:50You're wasting fuel and ice if you don't catch anything.
14:53Since the 1980s, he says, a block of ice has gone from $14 to $26 today.
14:59A set of new nets more than doubled, and a gallon of gas more than tripled in price.
15:04At 82 years old, Lonnie, who goes by Knuckles, hasn't given up trawling these waters,
15:10even after six decades.
15:12Starting in May, he heads out to catch brown shrimp, usually around sunset.
15:17You have to go do your homework and know where they're going to be at.
15:24He works independently, like most of the shrimpers here.
15:27Right about there.
15:30A little too far.
15:33During the day, brown shrimp may bury themselves in the sediment to hide from predators.
15:37But after dark, they often come out and roam in shallow water.
15:42Knuckles and his duckhand Steve drop these nets that skim the top of the water.
15:47We're not dragging anything on the bottom.
15:50He positions himself against the current, so the shrimp fall right into his nets.
15:54The shrimp are not like fish.
15:57They can't really swim that great.
16:01They take a ride on the current.
16:05Knuckles and Steve will pick out and keep just the shrimp.
16:08Sea turtles have an escape patch in the net, and other animals get thrown back into the sea,
16:13where some dolphins are waiting to chow down on them.
16:16If we don't pick up in their favor often enough, they'll take and bite it out of the net.
16:23They can literally rip a four-foot hole in it, which is going to take a lot of time to fix.
16:30Like this one. Knuckles pulls up the net so he can sew it closed.
16:34You're going to lose everything, you know?
16:37You're going to be working for literally nothing.
16:41This work can be grueling.
16:44Some shrimpers have big enough vessels they can stay out for weeks at a time.
16:48Knuckles has a smaller boat, so he fishes just until morning.
16:53It keeps you in shape.
16:55But even after all this work, there's a chance they could have a bad run.
16:59Tonight, most of the nets were full of catfish.
17:02Ooh, catfish.
17:06Full of shrimp.
17:09They went in the net and ate all the shrimp?
17:12They got a pound of shrimp. It's all catfish.
17:17I'm going to try pushing up, going a little further up in the lake or something.
17:22Knuckles spent $45,000 buying and fixing up his boat.
17:26It was meant to be his ticket to retirement.
17:29But now he's unsure that plan will work.
17:32You know, for me to get out the business, I've got to sell it.
17:35I've got no retirement.
17:38But I can't sell a boat. Can't give it away.
17:42Nobody wants it.
17:45And most shrimpers agree it's getting harder to justify going out.
17:50But this boat that leaves the dock, it's going to cost me over $1,000.
17:54It's killing us. The farmers, it's killing us.
17:57Right now, nobody wants to do it no more because they're struggling.
18:02Milena Cheave has been fishing for eight years.
18:05Like 60% of the state's shrimp boat owners, she and her husband are originally from Southeast Asia.
18:11With our education, there's nothing else we could do besides fisherman,
18:15especially like me and my husband, like in our mid-50s.
18:20Milena and her husband weren't able to go to college,
18:23but they hope shrimping would help their kids do the opposite.
18:26Not enough to pay, especially when you have two kids in college.
18:30You're struggling.
18:34Dock owners are feeling the impact too.
18:37Because if we don't bring no shrimp, they don't make no money either.
18:40You know, when the shrimp boats go out, they're going to kill the docks too.
18:46That's a pretty shrimp.
18:49Dean Blanchard's family has been buying and selling local shrimp for five generations.
18:54I was born in a shrimp dock. When I was a baby, they used to put me in a shrimp box.
18:59His dock, two hours south of New Orleans, was once one of the biggest shrimp suppliers in the country.
19:06But last year, he paid the lowest prices he ever has for the larger shrimp.
19:1030-something years ago, they went down from $5 to $1.30.
19:16That's because he's selling it for so little to the peeling factories.
19:20Right now, it's the cheapest I've ever seen in my life.
19:24I'm sick to my stomach. I ain't never seen nothing like this.
19:28Never, never in my life seen it this bad.
19:32In February 2025, Trump imposed a 10% tariff on Chinese imports, including food.
19:39In March, he increased it to 20%.
19:41China retaliated with 10 to 15% tariffs on many U.S. goods.
19:46The biggest retaliation so far, sparking a trade war.
19:50China supplies roughly 80% of the world's garlic, and the U.S. is one of its biggest customers.
19:56U.S. garlic producers like Christopher Ranch have accused China of undercutting the American garlic market.
20:03The U.S. started to import cheap garlic from China shortly after the Cold War.
20:08But Chinese bulbs sold for almost 50% less than American ones.
20:13The U.S. government accused Chinese producers of trying to gain a monopoly
20:17by selling garlic for less than what it takes to grow it, also known as dumping.
20:22By the mid-90s, Christopher Ranch sales had fallen by half, and the company started laying off workers.
20:29The U.S. government tried to control it with anti-dumping duties in 1994.
20:34But Chinese imports continued, and by 2004, the U.S. was importing over half of the garlic it consumed.
20:42Between 2001 and 2005, Christopher Ranch had slashed the land it farmed by 40%.
20:49And during this period, the U.S. garlic industry was losing an estimated $600 million to Chinese imports.
20:57Meanwhile, in China, garlic was beating gold stocks, becoming the country's most lucrative asset.
21:03Before the 1990s, nearly all the garlic consumed in America was grown in America.
21:08There used to be 12 commercial garlic growers in the country. Now we're down to three.
21:12And Ken often spoke about it, even on TV, as seen in this clip.
21:15He's just back from Washington, D.C., where he lobbied to help win a new 10% tariff on Chinese garlic.
21:21One of the hardest things I've ever done was actually going to D.C. and testifying,
21:25and offering evidence that the Chinese continue to impact and negatively hurt the domestic garlic industry.
21:31The U.S. imposed 25% tariffs on all Canadian food imports, which total roughly $40 billion a year.
21:38Canada retaliated with tariffs on U.S. goods.
21:41It is one of our biggest allies, our biggest trade partners.
21:45Things that we rely on Canada for, like cereal and meat and maple syrup, are going to become more expensive.
21:52The U.S. imports roughly $5 billion of cocoa products a year from Africa, including two-thirds of its cocoa beans.
22:00Countries like Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire are a vital source of beans for big U.S. chocolate companies like Mars Wrigley.
22:06But a virus called swollen shoot is killing cocoa trees across the continent
22:11and causing the price of chocolate to soar around the world.
22:20Joseph Sasu starts harvesting his 17 acres of cocoa in the central region of Ghana in October.
22:27Inside this healthy pod are the pearly white cocoa beans that will become chocolate.
22:31But in the last few years, Joseph has been finding more sick pods like this,
22:36completely black or covered in white fuzz.
22:41They've been infected with an incurable virus called swollen shoot.
22:51Tiny mealybugs spread the virus as they feed on the sap of the cocoa trees.
22:55Once it takes hold, the leaves turn yellow and turn black.
22:59Once it takes hold, the leaves can become discolored or die back.
23:04Stems might swell, and smaller pods may form.
23:09After a few years, swollen shoot can kill the plant.
23:20Ghana and Ivory Coast grow more than half of the world's cocoa crop.
23:24But for the third straight season, there hasn't been enough cocoa to meet global demand.
23:30This year, farmers are projected to harvest over 700,000 metric tons less than the previous season.
23:36Now, nearly a third of cocoa farmland in Ghana is infected.
23:41Last year, a little more.
23:52The only way to stop the spread is by cutting down the infected trees and planting new ones,
23:58which can take four years to grow fruit.
24:02Imagine from a smallholder's perspective, you're faced with a choice of removing,
24:06eliminating your potential to earn an income,
24:10or keeping that tree going for as long as you can.
24:14That's Christy Liesel, a 20-year veteran chocolate scholar.
24:18The longer you keep a tree around with swollen shoot virus,
24:21the more chance it has to spread to surrounding trees.
24:25Joseph has already removed about 1,500 infected trees within the last five years.
24:37South America supplies the U.S. with roughly $15 billion worth of food a year.
24:42Since 2020, the U.S. has relied more on Brazil for fresh beef,
24:47after droughts lowered other countries' exports.
24:50Peru and Bolivia produce most of America's quinoa
24:55and are the world's biggest exporters of the ancient seed.
24:58In the U.S., the product has become increasingly popular.
25:01America imports about a third of all the world's quinoa.
25:06But it wasn't always this way.
25:09Quinoa used to be mostly unknown outside of the Andes.
25:19But it all began to change in 2009,
25:22when the Peruvian government started establishing free trade agreements.
25:25It became easier for companies to export to the U.S. and beyond.
25:28Over the next few years, commerce between Peru and the U.S. reportedly boomed.
25:33Word spread about the nutritious superfood that was gluten-free and high in protein.
25:38This was when stuff like the keto diet were taking off
25:42and there was this kind of conventional wisdom that,
25:45hey, look, among all of those grains that you can be eating,
25:48quinoa probably packs the strongest punch in terms of protein.
25:52The United Nations even declared 2013 the International Year of Quinoa
25:56to celebrate the ancestral practices of the Andean people.
26:00Basically shining a big, bright spotlight on quinoa
26:04as something that people should consume for their health.
26:08And that really led to the whole thing.
26:10It's not unprecedented for a president to impose tariffs.
26:14What's unique about Trump's tariffs right now is the scale.
26:17He is imposing them against many of America's top trade allies
26:22where we get a lot of our products, especially our food products,
26:24Historically, tariffs have not had a super good economic impact.
26:31They always raise prices.
26:33But one of the things that works with tariffs
26:36that makes somebody like President Trump really adhere to them
26:40is that they produce revenue for the government.
26:44He said it's a tax on another country.
26:47But it's really a tax on the supplier of the good,
26:51trying to bring them into the United States.
26:54So who actually pays for that in a lot of ways
26:58is not only the supplier, the distributor, the retailer,
27:01it's the American consumer.
27:03Who actually makes money from this is actually the U.S. government.
27:21U.S. Money Reserve