Economic Crises in Foreign Markets Reduce U.S. Agricultural Exports
by William M. Liefert, Lorraine Mitchell, and Ralph Seeley
Highlights:
Economic crises in foreign markets reduce U.S. agricultural exports in several ways. An economic crisis will result in consumers earning a lower income in the affected countries, which leads to decreased demand for imported products. Additionally, a crisis can weaken the currencies of those countries against the U.S. dollar, making imports from the United States more expensive for their consumers.
During the world financial/economic crisis of 2008-09, agricultural imports from the United States by seven large foreign markets hit by the crisis (including Japan, China, the European Union, and Mexico) collectively fell in 2009 by 17 percent from $83 billion to $68 billion compared with 2008.