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The Maple Syrup Cartel

Tim Boyle
/
Getty Images

More than 70 percent of the world's maple syrup comes from the Canadian province of Quebec. Producing maple syrup is very dependent on the weather, but global demand doesn't quit just because of a bad spring. So the maple syrup producers of Quebec set production quotas to control over-production and a reserve, to make sure the supply never runs dry. That's right, there's a global strategic reserve of maple syrup.

Today on The Indicator, big maple. How Quebec's supply management system affects the rest of the syrup-producing world, and what that means for your breakfast table.

Music: Fancy Funk. Find us: Twitter/ Facebook. Instagram: @planetmoney

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Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Corrected: April 14, 2019 at 11:00 PM CDT
A previous version of the Web story incorrectly said Canada's government set up maple syrup production quotas and a reserve. In fact, production quotas and a reserve were created solely in the province of Quebec, and they were created by maple syrup producers, not by the Canadian government.
Stacey Vanek Smith is the co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money. She's also a correspondent for Planet Money, where she covers business and economics. In this role, Smith has followed economic stories down the muddy back roads of Oklahoma to buy 100 barrels of oil; she's traveled to Pune, India, to track down the man who pitched the country's dramatic currency devaluation to the prime minister; and she's spoken with a North Korean woman who made a small fortune smuggling artificial sweetener in from China.
Jane Lindholm is the host, executive producer, and creator of But Why: A Podcast For Curious Kids. Until March 2021, she was the host of the award-winning Vermont Public Radio program Vermont Edition.
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