The Perils of Protectionism

Trump's tariffs couldn't save the California olive industry

- Bryce Baschuk

Rod Burkett’s surrender came more from exasperation than defeat. After cultivating olive trees in the heart of California’s farming belt for 30 years, he finally sold his groves in 2022. “I just threw my hands up and said, ‘To hell with it,’ ” says Burkett, the former chairman of the Olive Growers Council of California and an early supporter of former President Donald Trump’s tariffs on olive imports from Spain.

Burkett says high fertilizer prices, rising labor costs, water shortages and steep taxes all factored into his decision. But his primary reason for walking away is that farmers in other countries— Spain, in particular—can grow, ship and sell their table olives in America at far cheaper prices. “It has been a great industry, but as far as long-term growth, I just don’t see it,” he says.

The withering away of California’s olive industry is a case study in how protectionist policies can backfire, creating losers on both sides— something to consider as the US and European Union gear up for a new subsidies race centered on semiconductors and electric vehicles.

Olives have been growing in California since the 18th century, when Spanish missionaries planted groves alongside the 21 Catholic missions stretching from San Diego to San Francisco. Today, most of the cultivation is centered in the Central Valley, a 400-mile stretch of fertile land between the Pacific coast and the Sierra Nevada mountain range that’s the source of almost half of all fruits, vegetables and nuts grown in the US.