The Trump administration has considered tariffs on Mexico, and the president is openly critical of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
So how could changes to Mexican imports affect our food prices? Let's consider the avocado.
The U.S. is the largest avocado importer in the world, and about 90 percent of our those imports come from Mexico.
And thanks to NAFTA, those avocados come into the country, duty-free.
Avocado imports that aren't duty-free get hit with a 11.2 cent-per-kilogram tariff.
From January to April 2017, the U.S. imported nearly 292 million kilograms of avocados from Mexico. At 11.2 cents per kilogram, we'd be talking about nearly $32.7 million in taxes.
Money from tariffs like that goes to the U.S. government, but those increased costs are usually passed on to consumers. On the flip side, new international tariffs typically mean U.S.-made products become more affordable.
But in the case of our avocado, the domestic market can't keep up with the domestic demand. California avocados only account for 8.3 percent of the green fruits in the U.S. market.
