Bbc
Head towards grocery store in the United States and shelves are filled with St Dalfour strawberry spread and preserves of raspberry good mom-some of the more than $ 200 million (154 million pounds sterling) in jams that Europe sends to the United States each year.
But try to look for American manufacturing jelly in Europe, and you are probably short.
The United States exports less than $ 300,000 (£ 231,000) to Jam each year to the block.
It is an imbalance that the American company JM SMUCKER, one of the largest sellers of these products in the United States, blame on an import tax of 24% greater on its fruit differences in the EU.
“The tiny value of American exports to the European Union is fully attributable to the high price of the EU,” wrote the company in a letter to the White House this month, asking the Trump administration to solve the problem while it is preparing to perceive “reciprocal prices” on the largest business partners in America.
“Reciprocal American prices on EU jams and frosts would be used to level the rules of the game,” said the company, noting that the highest American jam rate is currently only 4.5%.
Globally, Trump’s push to deploy tariffs against narrow trade partners – many of which have levels of means similar to that of America – has generated anger and perplexity, while attracting warnings of economists to higher prices and other potential economic pain.
In the United States, some companies have echoed these concerns, but Trump calls at prices also have been channeling long-standing frustrations that many companies have on foreign competition and the policies they face abroad.
Smucker’s letter was one of the hundreds of people submitted to the White House, seeking to influence the next series of prices, which should be revealed on April 2.
Apple producers have increased the great disparity in import rights that their fruits face in countries like India (50%), Thailand (40%) and Brazil (10%), as well as health rules in countries like Australia, they have unjustly declared their exports.
Streaming companies have reported digital taxes in Canada and Turkey who said “targeting and unjustly discriminating against American companies.
The oil and natural gas lobby has criticized the regulations in Mexico, which require a partnership with the State Company and other policies.
The White House itself highlighted the unequal ethanol prices in Brazil (18%, compared to 2.5% in the United States), car prices in Europe (10%, compared to 2.5% in the United States) and motorcycles in India (up to a few years ago, 100% against 2.4% in the United States).
Trump suggested that his reciprocal prices plan will help remedy such grievances, pumping his ad as “Liberation Day”.
But even companies looking for measures on their own problems have expressed hesitation in terms of the president’s pricing strategy, the request strategy, which risks reprisals and a broader trade war.
With imminent April 2, there remains a generalized uncertainty on the objectives and scope of the plans of the White House, especially since Trump launches more tasks.
“We are going to be nice,” he said this week, at the same time as he announced potentially devastating prices on foreign cars and car parts. “I think people will be pleasantly surprised.”
India has already declared that it would reduce its rates on motorcycles – an apparent bet that Trump prices are a strategy designed to obtain a leverage for commercial negotiations.
But analysts have warned that those who hoped that Trump plans to use his reciprocal prices to negotiate changes elsewhere could be disappointed, because the president also said that he could be satisfied to simply retaliate.
“Certain days, it is a question of taking revenge and equalizing things, and other days, it is a question of reducing prices, then other days, the third days, it is a question of providing manufacturing in the United States,” said William Reinsch, principal advisor to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington thinking group.
“He used them all at different times – there is not a single wire here on which you can count.”
Getty images
Trump displaying his car rates in the White House on Wednesday
The inadequacy between the baking tool of prices and niche problems The companies want the White House to take care of a delicate dance, because companies suggest prices in their own interest, while hoping to avoid the repercussions of the kind of radical tasks that Trump suggested could be on the table.
For example, the steel manufacturer Northstar Bluescope Steel, which employs 700 people in the United States, founding steel from recycled metal, urged Trump to extend the prices on steel and aluminum to parts.
At the same time, however, he asked for an exemption for the raw materials she needs, such as scrap metal.
Similarly, the group of Lobbies of JM SMUCKER and other major food manufacturers, the Consumer Brand Association, warned against the “too large and radical prices” which could eventually make its members to import ingredients like cocoa, which are not manufactured in the United States.
“I do not necessarily want the current administration to say, well, we will impose a price,” said Tom Madrecki, vice-president of the group’s supply chain, during a recent prices forum, organized by farmers for free trade.
“It is this meticulous balance between yes, I want you to take a commercial policy and an action in America to counter unfair trade policies abroad … but perhaps not quite in this way.”
Wilbur Ross, who was Trump’s trade secretary in his first mandate, said he thought that business worries would dissipate as Trump’s plans are becoming clear, calling on April 2 a “big step”.
But he noted that the president had seen little drawback to use prices, consider them as a source of new income, a means of reducing imports and encouraging more manufacturing.
“He is very committed,” said Ross. “People should have known that something like it was going to happen because he has been talking about it for many years.”
The Republicans, traditionally the pro-exchange party, remained favorable to Trump’s strategy, even if the pricing announcements were blamed for the recent sale and the weakness of the stock market in the recent surveys of companies and consumers.
During a recent trade audience, representative Jodey Arrington, a Republican who represents Texas, admitted that there could be “some pain associated at the front”, but maintained the concentration of Trump on the issue would create opportunities for his voters at the end.
“It seems to me just that it is not American not to fight so that our American manufacturers, producers and workers simply have a uniform playground,” he said.
“We are just trying … to reset these relationships as we play according to the same set of rules,” he added. “So everyone wins.”
