Food & Farming · Wednesday, 30 September 2026

01 Briefing what happened

The US stopped letting in Canadian spirits, wine and whey on Tuesday. Small Canadian distillers say the provinces' own shops are hard to get into

Food & Farming 14 sources

A US ban on about $967m a year of Canadian goods, most of it alcoholic drink, took effect on Tuesday. Big whisky brands may move their bottling to the US. Small distillers cannot, and selling across Canada means getting past each province's own liquor shops.

$967m

of Canadian goods a year now kept out of the US, on 2025 trade

The rest of the list includes whey and three-wheeled motorcycles made in Quebec. [4]

93%

of Canada's liquor exports were sold to the US in 2025

Canada's prime minister, Mark Carney, calls the bans relatively modest but says they will hurt the businesses named. [3]

About 1 in 3

of the Glenora distillery's sales normally come from US states

Its buyers are in states such as New York, California and Illinois. [2]

The lead story — what happened

A US ban on some Canadian goods took effect at 12:01 a.m. on Tuesday, 29 September. [1]
US border officers must now turn away Canadian wine, vermouth, many spirits, non-alcoholic beer, molasses and whey, a by-product of milk used in protein powder. [1][3][4]
The ban covers about $967m of goods a year on 2025 figures, and 87% of that is alcoholic drink, says the American Action Forum, a US research group. [4]
President Donald Trump signed the orders on 8 September. He says Canada treats US dairy, cars and alcohol unfairly. [3]
The ban punishes Canada for its own tariffs of 15%, 25% or 50% on US goods. Canada brought those in after the US put 50% tariffs on about $20bn of Canadian goods. [4]
Most Canadian provinces had already stopped selling US liquor in their shops. [3]
About half of the spirits Canada makes are sold abroad, and 93% of those go to the US, says Spirits Canada, the makers' group. [2]
Much drink shipped in bulk, unbottled, can still go south. Bottled whisky and most other packaged drink cannot. [2]
The owners of big brands such as Crown Royal and Canadian Club might move their bottling to the US. Most small distillers bottle their own, so they are shut out. [2]
Glenora, a distillery in Nova Scotia, normally makes about a third of its sales in US states. Its buyer was put off by the 50% tariffs, and the order sits in a tank on its dock. [2]
Selling across Canada instead is hard, because many provinces own the liquor shops and favour their own makers. The head of British Columbia's wine growers says Canadians often find it easier to buy wine from Europe than from another province. [2]
Economists call the ban small, about 0.25% of Canada's exports to the US by one estimate. A trade lawyer says the 50% tariffs had already made much of this trade not worth doing. [1][4]

Alcoholic drink87%
Whey, molasses, motorcycles13%

What the $967m US ban covers, by value on 2025 trade. Almost nine dollars in ten are drink.

Who is involved

Donald Trump

the US president; he signed the orders banning the goods on 8 September [3]
Mark Carney

Canada's prime minister; he called the bans relatively modest and wants to double Canada's trade with countries other than the US [3][4]
Canada's provinces

most run their own liquor shops; they pulled US drink from shelves and are slow to stock each other's [2][3]
Jamieson Greer

the US trade representative; he says there is no urgency on the US side to make a deal [5]
Small Canadian distillers

such as Glenora in Nova Scotia and Black Fox in Saskatchewan; they bottle their own drink, so the ban shuts them out [2]

How it unfolded

Early 2025 Most Canadian provinces take US alcohol off their shelves [2]
22 August US tariffs of 50% on some Canadian goods begin [2]
8 September Trump signs the orders announcing the bans [3]
29 September The bans take effect at 12:01 a.m. [1]
January The US threatens 50% tariffs on Canadian cars, car parts and steel [5]

Where this points

Watch whether Canada's provinces start stocking each other's bottles, and whether the two governments talk again; one trade lawyer expects the standoff to last months, not weeks. [2][4]

What is pushing on the whole day

The bar and the word are our reading of how hard each one is pushing today. The arrow is where it is heading. The evidence is in the stories below.

Unsold drink piling up High↑

A Nova Scotia distillery has a whisky order stuck in a tank on its dock. [2] Distilleries across Scotland have stopped making whisky because unsold stock is piling up. [6]

Governments shutting trade doors High↑

The US began turning away Canadian wine, spirits and whey on Tuesday. [1] The Philippines has stopped exports of fresh ube, a purple yam, to keep its planting stock at home. [13]

Different rules inside one country Building→

Canada's provinces run their own liquor shops and are slow to stock drink from other provinces. [2] England's new whisky rules are looser in places than Scotland's, and Scotch makers object. [7] England's approval of a gene-edited banana covers England only. [12]

Rain and war moving crops Building↑

Brazil's wettest winter in over 100 years is pushing sugarcane into fuel instead of sugar. [11] Blocked sea ports push Ukraine's grain onto the Danube river, adding about $50 a tonne. [14]

The rest of the day

7 more stories on this beat.

Each with its own sources. None of these is a link to the story above.

02
Scotch distilleries stop making whisky

Distilleries across Scotland have paused production because demand for Scotch has slumped and unsold whisky is piling up, a glut the trade calls a whisky loch. [6] One distillery's co-founder guesses the industry is making about a third of its normal amount. [6] Scotch must age at least three years in oak casks, so what is sold today was made years ago. [6] On Monday, workers at Cameronbridge began a strike over plans to cut hundreds of jobs. [6] It is the biggest distillery of Diageo, which makes about one in three bottles of Scotch. [6]

Why it matters — Scotch sells £5.36bn a year abroad. [6] US tariffs from April 2025 cut its sales to the US by 15%, the Scotch Whisky Association says, before the US lifted them this year. [6] Nick Morgan, a long-time whisky industry figure, expects makers to find they have too little whisky in about five years, when demand picks up. [6]
03
A new Roundup trial tests Bayer's court win

A jury in St. Louis, Missouri, began hearing a Roundup cancer case on Tuesday. [9] Roundup is a weedkiller made by Monsanto, the chemical company Bayer bought in 2018. [9][10] In June the US Supreme Court ruled that states cannot make a pesticide maker print a cancer warning that the national regulator, the EPA, has not required. [10] So the three women in this case argue instead that Roundup was badly designed and unsafe to sell. [9] Bayer says decades of studies show glyphosate, its active ingredient, is safe. [9]

Why it matters — About 65,000 people have sued Bayer over Roundup, and Bayer wants a different St. Louis judge to approve a $7.25bn deal settling nearly all current and future claims. [9] This trial is an early sign of whether claims that do not rest on the warning label can still win. [9]
04
Rain, not price, decides Brazil's sugar

Sugarcane mills in Brazil, the world's biggest sugar maker, will follow the weather rather than prices until the harvest ends in December, analysts told Reuters. [11] Each mill splits its cane between sugar and ethanol, a fuel. [11] By early July, mills had used only 42.5% of their cane for sugar. [11] Raw sugar prices rose more than 21% in August, which should pull mills towards sugar. [11] But parts of the cane belt had their wettest winter in over 100 years, and wet cane holds less sugar. [11]
- Made into sugar42.5%
- Made into ethanol fuel57.5%
How Brazil's mills had split their cane by early July: 42.5% to sugar, the rest to fuel.
Why it matters — Each extra percentage point of cane sent to sugar adds about 750,000 tonnes to world supply. [11] StoneX, a broker, says Brazil's output may not pass 38 million tonnes, below the 40 million expected, and a trading firm says prices could rise further. [11]
05
Ukraine eyes the Baltic for its grain

Ukraine's agriculture ministry said on 23 September that it is looking at sending grain through ports on the Baltic Sea, after a meeting with Estonia's agriculture minister. [14] Russian attacks have blocked Ukraine's Black Sea ports, which used to carry 90% of its exports. [14] Most of its grain now leaves through three ports on the Danube river, which adds about $50 a tonne. [14] Ukraine's ministry says the Baltic could take up to 20 million tonnes but would add about $100 a tonne. [14]

+$50 a tonneBy the Danube
+$100 a tonneBy the Baltic
The extra cost each route adds to a tonne of Ukrainian grain. The Baltic route would add about twice what the Danube does.

Why it matters — Ukraine's agriculture ministry says it would need up to $2bn in outside help, and it has not said who would pay. [14] Ukraine has no Baltic coast, so the grain would most likely cross Poland, where farmers protested against cheaper Ukrainian grain in 2022 and 2023. [14]
06
English whisky gets its own protected name

The UK government has given English whisky protected status, so only whisky made in England may use the name. [8] It joins more than 1,700 protected foods and drinks, such as the Cornish pasty. [8] English single malt may be mashed and fermented at one site and distilled at another, while Scotch single malt must be made start to finish at one distillery. [7] The UK farm ministry says there is no UK-wide definition of single malt, and each nation has its own traditions. [7]

Why it matters — The Scotch Whisky Association says the looser rules undermine what single malt means, and it is considering its next steps. [7] England has gone from one whisky distillery 20 years ago to more than 70. [7][8]
07
A banana that stays yellow nears English shops

A gene-edited banana that stays yellow for an extra day or two after peeling moved a step closer to English shops. [12] The UK farm ministry approved its marketing notice last week, confirming it is precision bred, meaning the change could have come from ordinary breeding. [12] Tropic, the Norwich company behind it, edited a gene so the fruit makes less of the enzyme that turns it brown. [12] The Food Standards Agency must still check its safety, and nobody can say how long that will take. [12]

Why it matters — A UK government study found 1.4 million edible bananas are thrown away every day. [12] No precision-bred food has yet been cleared for sale in England, and England's rules cover England only. [12]
08
The Philippines stops selling fresh ube abroad

The Philippines has stopped exports of fresh ube, a purple yam used in drinks, pastries and desserts. [13] Its agriculture secretary, Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr, says the country is short of material to plant and does not want other countries growing Philippine varieties to compete with it. [13] Ube harvests rose 17% in the first half of the year, to 5,660 tonnes, but the trade is growing faster than farmers can grow it, he says. [13] Processed and frozen ube can still be sold abroad. [13]

Why it matters — A Filipino food scholar says farmers sold so many tubers abroad that they used up the stock needed to plant the next crop. [13] A London cafe owner says he cannot get ube at the moment, though he has enough stock to last a year. [13]

02 Lesson why it matters

Why Canada has borders inside it

Each Canadian province runs its own drink shops and rules, so a bottle made in one province can find it hard to reach shelves in the next.

The twist

A Canadian can often buy wine from Europe more easily than wine from the next province. So when the US shut out their bottles, small Canadian makers had few shops at home ready to take them.

The picture

Kept in Canada50%
Sold to the US46.5%
Sold to other countries3.5%

Where Canada's spirits go, rounded from Spirits Canada's figures: about half leave the country, and 93% of those go to the US. That US share now needs other buyers.

How it works

Each Canadian province runs its own liquor shops and rules
A province stocks its own makers first; a bottle from next door needs permits, fees and weeks
So Canada's spirit makers sell about half abroad, nearly all of it to the US
On Tuesday the US began turning their bottles away
The home market cannot take them quickly, so orders wait on the dock

The same force, elsewhere today

Where this chain is also running, in today's other stories.

English whisky's protected name

The UK has no single definition of single malt, so England set its own rules, and on where a single malt must be made they are looser than Scotland's.
The banana that stays yellow

England's gene-editing rules cover only England, so a banana cleared there can be sold in Scotland and Wales only if it is not processed further.

Where you've seen this

Work licences

a nurse or an electrician qualified in one state or province often has to qualify again to work in the next

The European Union

its members agreed on shared product rules so goods can cross between them without new checks

The catch

A local rule can also protect something: Scotch makers say they spent tens of millions of pounds meeting their stricter single-malt rules, and that those rules built Scotch's name.

And the whole of it

Anyone buying wine in Canada chooses from shelves a province filled for them. The distiller in the next province may never get onto those shelves, and the shopper cannot see who was left off.

03 Truth what's really going on

What is really going on

Much of the trade the US has now banned had already stopped paying, because of the 50% tariffs in place since August. [4][2] The new harm lands on small Canadian distillers, who cannot move their bottling to the US like the big brands and struggle to get into other provinces' shops. [2]

Why it works on us — Set against $880bn of trade a year, a ban on $967m looks tiny. [4] Glenora, a Nova Scotia distillery, normally makes about a third of its sales in US states. [2]

Who gains

Owners of big Canadian whisky brands such as Crown Royal and Canadian Club — They may be able to move their bottling into the US, where the ban on bottled drink does not reach them. [2]
Wine makers in British Columbia and Ontario — Their provinces own the shops and show little interest in letting in bottles from other provinces, experts told Reuters. [2]
English whisky makers — Only whisky made in England may now be called English whisky, which one maker says stops cheap imports using the name. [8]
Tropic, the Norwich farm-biotechnology company — Its banana is one safety check from being the first precision-bred food cleared for sale in England, and it is already approved in 10 other countries. [12]
Ube growers in the Philippines — Their government is keeping fresh ube and its planting stock at home, so other countries cannot grow Philippine varieties to compete. [13]

Who pays

Small Canadian distillers such as Glenora in Nova Scotia — They bottle their own drink, so the ban shuts them out, and an order Glenora hoped to ship sits in a tank on its dock. [2]
Workers at Diageo's Cameronbridge distillery in Scotland — They began a strike on Monday against plans to cut hundreds of jobs as Scotch sales slump. [6]
People suing over Roundup — The June ruling closed the route of suing over a missing cancer warning, so they must prove the weedkiller itself was badly designed. [10][9]
Ukraine's grain sellers — The Danube route already adds about $50 a tonne, which makes their grain harder to sell, and the Baltic would add about $100. [14]
Cafes abroad that sell ube, such as Cafe Mama & Sons in London — The owner says he cannot get ube at the moment, though he has stock to last a year. [13]

What nobody knows yet

Open questions from across today’s stories — ours included.

01

How much Canadian drink will actually stop crossing.

Bulk drink can still go south, and big brands may move their bottling to the US to get round the ban. [2] A trade lawyer says the 50% tariffs had already stopped much of this trade. [4]
02

How big the ban is.

The BBC puts it at nearly C$1bn of liquor, plus whey. [3] AP cites $967m of goods on 2025 figures, 87% of it drink. [4] Capital Economics puts it at 0.25% of Canada's exports to the US. [1] The three figures measure different things.
03

Whether Canada's provinces will open their shelves to each other's drink.

Nine of ten provinces agreed in July to let makers sell straight to buyers anywhere, but not in shops. [2] Experts say provinces that own the shops have little reason to change. [2]
04

When talks between the US and Canada will restart.

The US trade representative says there is no urgency on the US side. [5] A trade lawyer expects the standoff to last months, not weeks. [4]
05

How much whisky Scotland is making now.

No industry figure is given. One distillery co-founder guesses about a third of the normal amount and says it is only his impression. [6]
06

Whether claims that Roundup was badly designed can still win in US courts.

The Supreme Court's June ruling was about warning labels, not design, and the St. Louis trial is an early test. [9][10] The EPA's new review of glyphosate is due by the end of 2026. [9]
07

How much sugar Brazil will make this season.

StoneX says output may not pass 38 million tonnes, against 40 million expected at the start, and more rain could lower it further. [11]
08

When the gene-edited banana could reach shops in England.

The Food Standards Agency still has to check its safety, and a scientist at the John Innes Centre says it is not clear how long that will take. [12]
09

Who would pay for Ukraine's grain to go by the Baltic.

Ukraine's agriculture ministry says it would need up to $2bn in outside help, and it has not named a source or explained how the grain would reach the ports. [14]

04 Hope carry this

The UK farm ministry has approved the marketing paperwork for a gene-edited banana that stays yellow for a day or two longer after peeling. A UK government study found 1.4 million edible bananas are thrown away every day.

Also true today

England had one whisky distillery 20 years ago. It has more than 70 now.
The Scotch whisky industry grew again in the first half of this year, and its exports to India have surged.
Farmers in the Philippines grew 5,660 tonnes of ube in the first half of this year, 17% more than a year before.