The President of the United States, Donald Trump reportedly issued a new memo on reciprocal trade on Thursday, which directed federal agencies to investigate ways to change tariff rates in the United States so that they are comparable to existing tariffs and certain economic obstacles that are implemented by other countries.
As many foreign capitals had anticipated, the order does not actually impose the duties immediately. Instead, it instructs the Commerce Department and the United States Trade Representative to deliver reports on the measures that need to be performed in order to obtain reciprocal trading status.
The candidate for the position of Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnick, stated that those studies should be finished by April 1.
The implementation of reciprocal tariff treatment would fulfill one of the promises that President Trump made during his campaign and would also address a trade issue that has been a source of frustration for the president and his economic team for a considerable amount of time.
Peter Navarro, who served as Trump’s trade adviser during his first term in office, was instrumental in encouraging Republican lawmakers to sign on to a reciprocal trade agreement.
There is no way to know which countries would be most impacted by the possibility of reciprocal trade actions taken by the United States; nonetheless, many of the countries that now have the highest tariff rates on commodities imported from the United States are countries like India, Brazil, Vietnam, Argentina, and a considerable number of other Southeast Asian and African nations.
A meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose country was singled out by the White House on Thursday for imposing duties on U.S. exports, was scheduled to take place a few hours before Trump issued the order.
It was also unclear what legal authority Trump would use to apply the tariffs, despite the fact that the White House suggested that numerous laws would most likely be utilized.
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