This text is taken from our newsletter “Le Courrier de l’économie” of May 23, 2022. To subscribe, click here.
The supply chain problems plaguing the world will at least have had educational virtues as to how the economy and trade work. One of those lessons will come through our hot dogs this summer.
Fans of the famous Dijon mustard have discovered that they will have to learn to do without their favorite condiment this year, or at least accept to pay more for it. It is true that the winter was rainy and ended with a few very cold days last year in the Burgundy region, which was very bad for the mustard grain harvest, but the problem isn’t really there, the British daily reported recently The Guardian.
The tragedy is that an obscure Canadian province called Saskatchewan suffered weeks of infernal heat and terrible droughts last summer, that it cut agricultural yields there in half… and that the famous French mustard is made from 60% to 80% from Canadian grain.
Canada, a superpower
The French should not be too offended by this great dependence in the field. Canada is THE world superpower in this area, with 50% of the production of condiment mustards on the planet, reported Radio-Canada’s La Semaine verte program last fall. It exports, on average, 70,000 tons of yellow mustard each year, particularly to the United States, where it is used in the production of common yellow mustard. About 30,000 tonnes of brown mustard seeds mainly take the road to Europe, in particular to enter the manufacture of Dijon mustard, while 10,000 tonnes of oriental mustard are sold in Asia.
The United States was thus the first export market for Canadian producers with more than half of their receipts of 117 million, indicates Ottawa, followed by Belgium, with 17% of the total, and Japan (3%), the France only coming in 32nd.
Nor should the French be too embarrassed not to have been aware of Canada’s central importance in the field. A few years ago, the Canadian government itself considered imposing trade tariffs on US yellow mustard imports in retaliation for Donald Trump’s protectionism. He changed his mind when he realized that this mustard was largely made from Canadian grains.
Less dependent than the French on imports of Canadian grain, German mustard makers thought they were better off, the magazine observed last month. Inspiration. However, they became disillusioned when Russian tanks ransacked the fields of their Ukrainian suppliers.
Croissants and chocolatines
sort of return of things, The Journal of Montreal reported last Thursday that it would be more difficult, this summer, in Quebec, to find the same good croissants and chocolatines as usual. It is that you need a fattier butter, which contains less water and is more resistant to heat to perfectly succeed in these delights, it was explained. Called “tourage butter”, this secret ingredient is strangely not produced in Quebec, but is imported… from France, of course.
However, it is difficult to respond to the explosion in the popularity of pastries in the world, particularly in Asia, reported the French press at the beginning of the year. Additionally, Canada limits the amount of dairy products that can be imported each year. And as the demand for croissants and chocolatines is also on the rise here, the limit of tourage butter would now be reached.