The European Union has delayed its first counter-measures against america over President Donald Trump’s metals tariffs until mid-April, allowing it to re-think which U.S. goods to hit and offering extra weeks for negotiations.
The European Commission had proposed re-imposing 2018 tariffs on 4.5 billion euros ($4.9 billion) of U.S. products on April 1, followed by hitting an additional 18 billion euros of U.S. goods on April 13.
“We at the moment are considering to align the timing of the 2 sets of EU counter-measures so we are able to seek the advice of with member states on each lists concurrently, and this could also give us additional time for negotiations with our American partners,” European Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic told a hearing on the European Parliament on Thursday.
The commission subsequently confirmed all EU counter-measures would take effect in mid-April.
The primary set of counter-measures includes applying a 50 per cent tariff on U.S. bourbon. Trump threatened to slap a 200 per cent tariff on all wines and other alcoholic products coming from the EU if the bloc went ahead with this.
The Trump administration can be planning “reciprocal” tariffs on April 2to rebalance the worldwide trading system.
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Sefcovic indicated that he had made limited headway with U.S. counterparts in talks to date, comparable to on his proposal to debate on lowering import duties on industrial goods.
“I don’t think that the U.S. pondering is in that direction,” he said, adding its priority gave the impression to be to attract investment and re-industrialize.
“And currently they consider that one of the best solution to do that is thru the tariff policy. I hope that at some point we’ll get to this discussion, but currently we’re clearly not there,” he said.
The counter-measure delay could allow for some adjustment to the U.S. goods targeted.
French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou said on Sunday that the EU was probably mistaken in targeting American whiskey, while Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni cautioned EU partners on Tuesday against escalating the trade dispute with america.
“I’m not certain that responding to tariffs with more tariffs is necessarily an excellent deal,” Meloni, who’s near Trump, said.
France and Italy are the most important exporters of wine to america.
Prime Minister Micheal Martin of Ireland, a serious whiskey exporter, said on Thursday it was sensible that Europe was giving itself time after April 2 to evaluate the U.S. package of measures after which “properly and strategically respond.”
