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- The M&E Dispatch // 130
The M&E Dispatch // 130
I was right (but I wish I wasn't) - Here we go again...
Lee Tengum
December 09, 2025
Hello Everyone,
Back in January 2025, when I published "Saskatchewan's Potash may be Canada's Trump Card," the warning was straightforward: if potash ever lands in the middle of a trade fight, it won't look like lumber or steel, it'll look like someone taking a direct run at your food system.
I argued that the tariffs were coming fast, that Washington was operating with "a plan without a plan," and that nobody seemed to have thought through what happens when you pick a fight with the hands that grow your food.
Here we are in December. Trump just threatened "very severe tariffs" on Canadian fertilizer.
And I'm asking you the same question I asked nine months ago: Did anyone actually think this through?
From Theory to Your Bottom Line
This isn't theoretical anymore. This is your supply chain, your input costs, your margins, and your ability to plan beyond the next news cycle.
If you're a farmer, you're staring at fertilizer bills that could swing 25–35% based on whatever Trump decides to do on a Thursday morning. If you're a food company, your cost structure just became a political hostage. If you're a Canadian potash producer, you're operating in an environment where the same tariff gets imposed, reduced, lifted, and re-threatened four times in eleven months.
That's not a trade policy. That's chaos with a strategy memo attached.
And it's tiring.
Between February and December, we saw exactly what the article predicted:
Tariffs get thrown at potash as political theatre
American farmers immediately panic because they need Canadian potash and there is no alternative, well there is, Russia is the second largest producer…
Washington backs down under pressure, but only partially, and only temporarily
A few months later, the threats come back, sometimes worse than before
This is the "plan without a plan" in action. It's not strategy. It's not industrial policy. It's leverage deployed because it works in the short term and because nobody seems willing to call the bluff.
But here's the thing: You don't have the luxury of waiting for Washington to figure out what it's doing. You have to figure out what you're doing right now.
Three Things You Should Know
One: Your supply chain is now a political instrument. Potash isn't just a commodity anymore. It's critical infrastructure for American food security, which means it will be treated like energy or semiconductors, subject to abrupt tariffs, temporary exemptions, and permanent uncertainty. If you're still pricing potash as "just another input," you're underpricing the risk.
Two: "Friendly" no longer means "safe". Canada is a treaty ally and an integrated supply partner. And it just got tariffed four different ways in eleven months. If you thought USMCA or integrated continental supply chains meant immunity from political trade shocks, this year has taught you otherwise.
Three: Canada might finally stop playing defence. The original article asked whether Ottawa would consider an export tax on potash if Washington kept swinging tariffs. That's not a rhetorical question anymore. Premiers are openly discussing export controls. Commentators are calling for retaliation. The conversation has shifted from "how do we absorb this" to "what leverage do we actually have?"
If you're an American buyer betting on stable Canadian supply, that should worry you.
The Real Question
The article ended with a simple statement: Canada has been playing a gentleman's game when it should be playing hard-nosed hockey.
Nine months later, not much has changed on their end, except now we all know what the game actually looks like.
So the question for you right now isn't whether new tariffs will always loom. They will.
The question is whether you're going to keep acting like this is temporary market volatility, or whether you're going to start building your business around the assumption that tariffs, export controls, and political weaponization of supply chains are now permanent features of the landscape.
Because if you don't, someone else will. And they'll take the ground while you're still waiting for things to go back to normal.
// The Dirt
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// The Hustle
On the lighter side of things, this Don Davies speech, if you haven’t seen it yet, is an absolute gem. Thanks to my wife for sending this my way.
Have a good week all!
-Lee