Mexico confident it can renew tomato agreement with US

MEXICO CITY, April 15 (Reuters) - The Mexican government said on Tuesday it hopes to begin talks with the United States to renew a bilateral agreement on Mexican tomato exports from which Washington has said it intends to withdraw.

The pullout by the U.S. entails duties of nearly 20.91% on most Mexican tomato exports from July 14, after the U.S. Commerce Department said the agreement had failed to protect domestic tomato growers.

The agreement, which regulates Mexican tomato exports to the U.S. in a bid to allow U.S. producers to compete fairly, was first struck in 1996 and last renewed in 2019 to avert an anti-dumping investigation and end a tariff dispute.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said in her regular press conference on Tuesday that the Mexican tomato in the U.S. market "is not substitutable by any other in the world" by quantity or quality.

"This process has happened many times and Mexico has always won," Sheinbaum added, speaking about the revisions to the tomato suspension agreement and stressing that without that pact U.S. consumers would have to pay for more tomatoes.

Mexican Agriculture Minister Julio Berdegue said that 90% of the tomatoes exported by Mexico go to the United States.

According to official figures, Mexico exported $3.3 billion of tomatoes last year.

"A 90-day window is now open, there is going to be a conversation with the United States, we are looking for this agreement to be renewed," Berdegue said.

"They already did it in 2019, just like now," he added.

Mexico and the United States have another similar agreement that covers sugar under which Mexico can only send sugar to the United States under a system of quotas and quality specifications.

Sheinbaum and Berdegue also said Mexico has its own anti-dumping investigations that could be activated on two U.S. products: chicken and pork.