Top 10 Turkey Trade Facts For That Most American Of Holidays

Here are 10 turkey-trade tidbits — call them side dishes — on this most American of all holidays, all of them having to do with the unfortunate guest of honor for the day, the turkey.

1. Canada has been the only country to import whole turkeys, whether fresh or frozen, into the United States for for at least 20 years, except for 2005 and 2019, when Israel imported a small number of fresh turkeys.
2. Fear not, deficit hawks: Exports rule the roost. The United States has run a trade surplus also goes back decades. Largest surplus? That came in 2016, when the deficit stood at $77.54 million.
3. Fear a little bit, deficit hawks: That surplus has declined in five of the seven years since that record was set. In 2023, it was $51.79 million. The surplus in 2022, $40.25 million, was the lowest since 2008.
4. Perhaps more telling is the percentage of total turkey trade that is an export compared to an import. This year, through September, the latest data available, that percentage is 87.06%. By way of comparison, in the case of overall U.S. trade, 39% is an export.
5. But don’t think it’s because the world loves American turkeys. The value of total U.S. exports of turkeys the last 20 years is $1.11 billion. The value of all poultry imports, largely chicken, just in the month of September, the most recent U.S. Census Bureau data available, was $451 million; the value year-to-date is $3.51 billion.
6. Mexico is the largest but not only customer for American turkeys, largely frozen of late. For the first time this year, Mexico is accounting for more than half of all those U.S. exports, 53.97%. Frozen turkeys are accounting for just under 30% of the total this year for only the fourth time in two decades.
7. Mexico used to purchase a great deal more fresh turkeys. As recently as the first nine months of 2022, the total for fresh turkey exports was $18.18 million, 99.05% of the total for all fresh turkeys. This year, that total is $8.05 billion, 96.22% of the total, and a decrease of 55.72% in just two years.
8. Frozen turkey exports have taken a bit of a tumble through September, though that is not the ultimate predictor of the annual totals since most exports occur in — you guessed it — November. But, through September of this year — when compared to the same time period in 2023 — exports are off 27.01%.
9. That decline in frozen turkey exports is not about Mexico. Exports to Mexico have increased 22.20% this year to a record of $11.33 million for September YTD data.
10. The big decrease in exports of frozen turkeys this year is to Panama, down 78.86%, Guatemala, down 72.85% and El Salvador, down 83.97%.

In the end, it’s a hemispheric story, principally a USMCA story, which has been in the news of late given President-elect Trump’s declaration that tariffs are coming to Canada and Mexico.

The United States supplies most of the exports, a majority of which head to Mexico, largely through Laredo and other Texas border crossings, and Canada provides a smattering of imports, largely through the Detroit and Buffalo areas.