U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday unveiled new tariffs on exports from dozens of trading partners, including a 19% tariff on Pakistani goods, down from a 29% tariff imposed on the country earlier this year.
On Wednesday, Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb announced Islamabad had finalized a trade agreement with Washington. Confirming the development, Trump said the U.S. would help Pakistan develop its “massive oil deposits” and was currently deliberating on the company that would proceed with the initiative.
In an executive order detailing the latest tariffs, issued ahead of Trump’s Aug. 1 deadline for individual deals, Pakistan was slapped with a 19% tariff against India’s 25%. Additionally, Trump’s administration had imposed a 35% duty on Canada, 50% on Brazil, 20% on Taiwan, and 39% on Switzerland. The new tariffs come into effect from Aug. 7.
The order includes an exception for some goods shipped within the coming week, while all countries not explicitly named would be subject to a 10% import tax. The administration has indicated negotiations are ongoing with several countries on new trade deals, suggesting the duties may be revised in the coming days.
Trump’s order said that some trading partners, “despite having engaged in negotiations, have offered terms that, in my judgment, do not sufficiently address imbalances in our trading relationship or have failed to align sufficiently with the United States on economic and national-security matters.”
The U.S. president’s order for Canada, raising its tariff from 25% to 35%, states it had “failed to cooperate” in curbing illicit narcotics flows into the U.S. However, Mexico has been granted a 90-day reprieve from higher tariffs of 30% on many goods to provide more time to negotiate a broader trade pact.
The hefty 25% duty on India reportedly stems from the country’s refusal to grant access to its agriculture sector, as well as an unspecified penalty for India’s purchases of Russian oil.
Still pending is a potential deal between China and the U.S., as the Aug. 12 deadline for a durable tariff agreement nears. Beijing and Washington reached preliminary deals in May and June to end escalating tit-for-tat tariffs and a cut-off of rare earth minerals, with a U.S. official maintaining they are progressing toward a deal.