India wont stay still with US measures
The measures imposed by the President of the United States, Donald Trump, signed on March 8 have provoked the response of several nations. China was one of the first to increase metal tariffs and India recently joined with the increase in tariffs that, in the case of some products will reach up to 60 percent above.
The regulations established by the US president impose tariffs of up to 25 percent on imports of steel and 10 percent on aluminum, with the justification of ‘protecting the national security’. However, India imposed a counterpart and will establish the increase of tariffs on American agricultural products, metals, and steel.
The measure will take effect next August 4. According to the statement issued by the Government of India, the US goods most affected by the new tariffs will be nuts, as well as some types of apples and legumes. The chickpeas will be the most affected since their import tariffs will go up to 60 percent.
The tariffs of other elements such as brine shrimp -a type of crustacean- will increase from 5 to 15 percent; boric acid, on the other hand, will increase its percentage on 2.5. Finally, the lentils will acquire a new tax of 30 percent.
Before announcing the measure, the Indian Minister of Trade and Industry, Suresh Prabhu, warned that the physical limitations to trade can affect the recovery of the global economy. The politician explained that these actions will eventually have a negative impact on factors such as jobs, which will decrease, the growth of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the economic development rate. This will ultimately harm all countries and could also cause irreparable damage to the multilateral trading system, based on universally recognized rules.
In this way, India enters the commercial war against Trump. It is worth mentioning that the Asian country imported US goods worth 26,611 million dollars, around 22,915 million euros, during the past year. For its part, the European Union recently announced new customs taxes worth 2800 million euros to a list of US products, something very similar to the decision of China, whose tariff measures will impose a tax of 50,000 million dollars.
So what's left is to wait to see how this war ends.
