Local farmers win on price in 30 of 74 products

On August 23, 2026, NotiCel summarizes a UPR study: local farmers win on price in 30 of 74 agricultural products against imports. The finding does not say the island is self-sufficient. It says there is a band of crops in which the farm already comes out cheaper, and that there is room there to replace purchases from abroad.

Replacing corn, peppers, tomatoes, grapefruit, and yautía, according to the study the outlet cites, would move $73.6 million in direct effects and up to $117.8 million with multipliers. Those two magnitudes belong to the study, not to a harvest count by this magazine. The note does not publish a planting calendar or a new tariff for those five crops. It publishes the substitution exercise.

The same work places agriculture at 0.6 percent of gross domestic product and 1.5 percent of employment. Imports cover more than 75 percent of food. The Jones Act and tariffs, according to that coverage, add about 11.9 percent to the cost of importing. Three shares and a surcharge: copied as they came out, without turning them into a manifesto for or against cabotage.

The study measures 74 products and finds a price advantage in 30. NotiCel does not list the rest of the table one by one. The headline stays with the 30. A reader who wants the full table has to go to the study and to the outlet's URL.

August's drought, covered in other El Nuevo Día notes on the 6th, the 13th, and the 25th, does not enter here with lost acres or with an adjustment to the 0.6 percent of GDP. That would be another figure. The UPR study, on NotiCel's date, talks about farm-gate price and possible substitution. Agriculture stays in those terms: 30 of 74, five named crops, and the multipliers the outlet did print.

Source: NotiCel. https://noticel.com/noticias/20260823/agricultores-boricuas-pueden-competir-en-precio-con-las-importaciones-en-30-de-74-productos-agricolas/