Business

A ‘smart’ bottle opener, weak and alcohol-free ales and lagers and cannabis brews – all visions of the future of beer offered at a brewing convention in Brussels this week.

More than 700 brewers and beer experts, from small microbrewers to megabrew executives, converged in Belgium, for many the home of beer, to debate hot topics in the $600 billion sector – including how to win drinkers back from wine and spirits.

Sessions on beer and food pairings sought to show how ales or lagers could challenge the dominance of wine during meals.

Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s largest brewer, has set increasing beer’s share of the overall drinks market as a top priority this year. Carlos Brito, its chief executive, told fellow brewers the sector should target mealtimes and women as areas of future growth.

Consumers should expect an even wider variety of products, particular of higher priced “premium” beers.

“Premiumization has arrived in, for example, confectionery. Look at chocolate. We have a long path ahead of us,” he said.

Cees’t Hart, the head of Carlsberg, called wine and tea “the enemy” and said brewers had identified a gap between beer and soft drinks – with low and no-alcohol brands that promised to be healthier than soda alternatives.

“That’s what we can own. This could be the future for the brewing industry,” he said.

Brewers AB InBev, Heineken, Carlsberg and China’s CR Snow sell about half of all beer drunk across the globe, but a growing number of smaller craft brewers, traditionally known for stronger ales, were also brewing low and no alcohol varieties.

Spiros Malandrakis, head of alcohol drinks research at Euromonitor International, said craft beers themselves appeared to have hit a plateau in the United States, with an estimated 6,000 breweries, but could expect to emerge in countries such as China and Vietnam.

Malandrakis also pointed to cannabis as a future growth segment, noting Constellation Brands’ $191 million investment in Canada’s Canopy Growth Corp, the first major drinks producer to invest in legal cannabis.

“The problem is that consumed in beer it would takes two to three hours to have an effect,” he said, adding a lot of effort was being put into studies to reduce this delay.

Downstairs at the convention, exhibitors displayed everything from tanks to taps and marketing to bottling technology that any budding microbrewer could want.

Among them was a device billed as the world’s first smart bottle opener, which connects to the Internet.

Although bottles must still be opened by hand, the device recognizes the bottle top and transmits that information by WiFi.

This allows brewers, large and small, to see how fast their beers are actually being consumed in bars, rather than just stocked, and also to offer promotions in real-time to push a particular brand.
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Argentina could revise the fiscal targets set as part of a $50 billion financing arrangement with the International Monetary Fund to increase spending on social programs, an IMF director said on Friday.

Argentina requested IMF assistance on May 8 after a run on its peso currency in an investor exodus from emerging markets.

The country’s stocks rallied on the deal to provide a safety net and avoid the frequent crises of the country’s past.

Many Argentines blame the austerity measures the IMF imposed under a previous bailout during its 2001-2002 economic crisis for plunging millions into poverty, but the organization said spending on programs to protect the poor could actually increase under the financing arrangement.

“The fiscal targets can be revised in case there is a need to increase social spending,” said IMF Western Hemisphere Director Alejandro Werner, adding that Argentina’s economy today is “very different than 2001.”

“That way, society does not have to choose between building a bridge or protecting the poorest.”

As part of the deal announced Thursday night, the government agreed to speed up reductions in the primary fiscal deficit to balance the budget by 2020. The government also pledged to propose legislation for a more independent central bank to fight double-digit inflation, which Werner praised on Friday.

Opposition politicians aligned with former populist President Cristina Fernandez have said market-friendly President Mauricio Macri was repeating earlier mistakes.

“Argentines do not want to go back to the past. It cost us a lot to get away from the Fund, and we do not want to go back there,” said Carlos Castagneto, a lawmaker aligned with Fernandez.

The benchmark Merval stock index rose 3.8 percent on the deal. Bonds rose modestly, with Argentina’s country risk — a J.P. Morgan measure of the difference between the country’s bond yields and less risky alternatives — down five points at 476 as of 3:56 p.m. local time (1746 GMT).

Argentina’s 100-year bond maturing in 2117 was up 0.2 percent at 87 cents on the dollar.

“The deal between Argentina and the IMF reduces immediate external financing risks and will help speed up fiscal consolidation,” said Gabriel Torres, a vice president at credit rating agency Moody’s.

Peso weakens

The deal still needs approval from the IMF board, which is expected to discuss it at a June 20 meeting. Treasury Minister Nicolas Dujovne said on Thursday he expected Argentina to receive a disbursement of 30 percent of the total, or roughly $15 billion, in the days following approval.

Finance Minister Luis Caputo said the government would not necessarily use the rest of the money and may return to bond markets to finance the estimated $22 billion in financing Argentina needs in 2019 to cover its fiscal deficit.

“If you need it you can use it, but if we regain access to the market at good rates, it is better to save it,” Caputo told investors on a conference call, according to a Finance Ministry statement.

The peso touched a record-low 25.66 per U.S. dollar after the central bank stopped a weeks-long defense of the currency. It later rebounded to close down 1.5 percent at 25.37 per dollar.

For the past few weeks, the central bank has offered to sell $5 billion in reserves at 25 pesos per dollar every day, effectively preventing the currency from falling below that level. That offer did not appear on Friday, traders said.

 
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China’s trade surplus with the United States rose to $24.58 billion in May, from $22.15 billion in April, according to Chinese customs data published Friday.

China’s export growth in May was 12.6 percent, slightly down from 12.9 percent in April, but well above the 10 percent that economists polled by the Reuters news agency had predicted.

Chinese imports also increased year over year in May, rising 26 percent.

For the first five months of the year, China’s trade surplus with U.S. was $104.85 billion.

Both countries have threatened to hike tariffs on goods worth up to $150 billion each, as President Donald Trump has demanded Beijing open its economy further and address the U.S. large trade deficit with China.

Earlier this week, China warned the U.S. that any trade and business agreements between the two countries “will not take effect” if Trump’s threatened tariff hike and other measures on Chinese goods are implemented.

The warning came after U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Liu He ended two days of talks in Beijing aimed at settling the simmering trade dispute, in which Beijing pledged to narrow its trade surplus.

The White House renewed a threat last week to raise duties on $50 billion of Chinese technology-related goods over that dispute.
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Just less than $6 billion worth of U.S. waste was sent to China last year to be converted into packaging and products, and then shipped back to the United States and other markets. Scrap recyclers had taken advantage of low shipping costs for empty containers returning to China after the ships had unloaded their goods on the U.S. West Coast.

Today, that flow of trash is just a trickle, the result of a Chinese ban that went into effect Jan. 1 on many types of foreign garbage, from mixed papers to waste textiles.

The result of the ban is seen at a recycling facility in Anaheim, California, owned by Republic Services, a national company headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona. The parking lot of the materials recovery facility (MRF) is brimming with 2,400 bales of mixed paper that once would have been bound for China.

The surplus is a result of an unprecedented 12-day backlog, said James Castro, the facility’s general manager.

And it’s not clear where it’s all going.

China has banned imports of mixed paper, as well as low-grade plastics, certain metals and other types of waste. In April, it expanded the ban, to go into effect later this year, to include more metals and chemical waste. A ban on additional kinds of scrap, including waste timber, is being targeted for the end of 2019.

 

WATCH: China Trash Ban Creates Crisis for US Recyclers

Less-contaminated scrap

It has also imposed stricter contamination standards on the scrap it does accept, allowing only 0.5 percent contaminants, down for most materials from 1.5 percent.

That has slowed the sorting process, said Richard Coupland, Republic’s vice president of municipal sales.

Further complicating matters, the ban has led to a huge reduction in worldwide prices on recyclable goods, such as mixed paper.

One year ago, bales of unsorted paper, like those now stacked in the parking lot, would have been worth $100 a ton. Today, each ton is worth “less than $5, or negative in some markets,” including shipping costs, Coupland said. He added that much of the industry’s backlog may end up in landfills.

To the north in the city of Azusa, Waste Management’s MRF is also dealing with tightened standards for the workers and sorting machines that use magnets, optical sensors and other means to separate the waste. Executives say they are tweaking a costly system that was designed to meet China’s insatiable craving for scrap.

Asia-based journalist Adam Minter, author of the book Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion-Dollar Trash Trade, sums up the dilemma facing these companies.

“Recycling is about manufacturing,” Minter said, “and if somebody doesn’t want to use those raw materials, then putting stuff in your recycling bin is doing nothing more than playing with your garbage.”

He says China’s trash ban is spurred partly by a desire to clean up the environment, but even more by nationalism and a desire for political control.

“When you see China pushing against the recycling industry,” Minter said, “it’s really pushing against private industry and in favor of state-owned enterprises, and that is very much in line with the way that Chinese economic policy has been going for the last five years.”

​‘Shockwaves around the world’

Some environmentalists have welcomed the trash ban.

Greenpeace East Asia plastic campaigner Liu Hua said it will send “shockwaves around the world” and force countries to confront their attitudes toward waste, especially environmental contaminants like plastics.

China expert Joshua Goldstein of the University of Southern California said the ban will have social repercussions in China.

Goldstein has studied the informal sector of 3-5 million small-scale recyclers, entrepreneurs whom he says are “picking through (trash) and making their lives slightly better every day through the money that they made.”

“It had environmental repercussions,” he said, “but it also raised 3 to 5 million households out of poverty.”

Goldstein said China faces hurdles to create an operation as efficient.

Companies are also searching for new markets. More recyclable scrap from the United States will now go to India, Vietnam, Malaysia, Thailand or Indonesia, but industry experts say shipping costs are high and demand in those countries is limited.

As commodity prices drop, there is hope for increased use for scrap such as mixed paper in the United States.

​Cleaning up waste

Brent Bell, vice president of recycling operations for Waste Management, said his company is also cleaning up its waste to meet the higher standards that China and other countries are demanding.

“I think as an industry, we’re all at fault to some degree,” Bell said, noting the company is working to educate consumers about better recycling. “Something we all missed as an industry,” he added. “Whether we’re shipping material to China, to India, or even to Louisiana, our customers all want to make sure the material is as clean as possible.”

Republic’s Coupland said the waste and recycling industry needs to work with local communities to find a new business model to replace one that has become unsustainable. It could mean, he said, an increase in the rate that consumers pay for hauling away their trash.

China may yet make adjustments to its policies, USC’s Goldstein added.

Paper fiber is hard to replace, he notes, and China may loosen its bans to bring in the raw materials that its manufacturers require.

“What parts of this reform, this ban, are going to be long term and what parts are going to be short term is still quite unclear,” Goldstein said. But he noted that the economics of the recycling industry are changing.
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Ukraine’s parliament has voted to establish an anti-corruption court in an effort to meet the criteria to receive $17.5 billion from the International Monetary Fund.

 

Before the IMF releases the funds needed to shore up Ukraine’s struggling economy, it will have make sure the court’s laws are IMF compliant. The West has repeatedly called on Ukraine to reform it political system and establish an independent body to fight corruption.

 

“What we’ll be looking to see is that it ensures the establishment of an independent and trustworthy anti-corruption court that meets the expectation of the Ukrainian people,” IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said at a briefing Thursday.

 

President Petrol Poroshenko said the court was in line with Western recommendations and Ukrainian law.  

 

Last year Poroshenko rejected the need for an anti-corruption court, saying such institutions are needed in “Kenya, Uganda, Malaysia and Croatia” but not in Western Europe or the United States.

 

While the approval of the court was seen as a positive, Ukraine also likely dismayed the West by firing Finance Minister Oleksandr Danylyuk, a respected reform advocate.

Danylyuk’s ouster came after he took on Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman, accusing him of stalling reforms of the state tax service that are needed to combat corruption.

 

Before the parliament voted on his ouster, Danylyuk addressed the lawmakers, telling them he had been accused of “defending the interests of international organizations.”

 

But, “I am defending the interests of Ukrainians,” he said.
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President Donald Trump’s tariff on imported solar panels has led U.S. renewable energy companies to cancel or freeze investments of more than $2.5 billion in large installation projects, along with thousands of jobs, the developers told Reuters.

That’s more than double the about $1 billion in new spending plans announced by firms building or expanding U.S. solar panel factories to take advantage of the tax on imports.

The tariff’s bifurcated impact on the solar industry underscores how protectionist trade measures almost invariably hurt one or more domestic industries for every one they shield from foreign competition. 

Trump announced the tariff in January over protests from most of the solar industry that the move would chill one of America’s fastest-growing sectors.

​Utility-scale projects

Solar developers completed utility-scale installations costing a total of $6.8 billion last year, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. Those investments were driven by U.S. tax incentives and the falling costs of imported panels, mostly from China, which together made solar power competitive with natural gas and coal.

The U.S. solar industry employs more than 250,000 people, about three times more than the coal industry, with about 40 percent of those people in installation and 20 percent in manufacturing, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

“Solar was really on the cusp of being able to completely take off,” said Zoe Hanes, chief executive of Charlotte, North Carolina solar developer Pine Gate Renewables.

Companies with domestic panel factories are divided on the policy. Solar giant SunPower Corp opposes the tariff that will help its U.S. panel factories because it will also hurt its domestic installation and development business, along with its overseas manufacturing operations.

“There could be substantially more employment without a tariff,” said Chief Executive Tom Werner.

​Lost profits, jobs

The 30 percent tariff is scheduled to last four years, decreasing by 5 percent per year during that time. Solar developers say the levy will initially raise the cost of major installations by 10 percent.

Leading utility-scale developer Cypress Creek Renewables LLC said it had been forced to cancel or freeze $1.5 billion in projects, mostly in the Carolinas, Texas and Colorado, because the tariff raised costs beyond the level where it could compete, spokesman Jeff McKay said.

That amounted to about 150 projects at various stages of development that would have employed 3,000 or more workers during installation, he said. The projects accounted for a fifth of the company’s overall pipeline.

Developer Southern Current has made similar decisions on about $1 billion of projects, mainly in South Carolina, said Bret Sowers, the company’s vice president of development and strategy.

“Either you make the decision to default or you bite the bullet and you make less money,” Sowers said.

Neither Cypress Creek nor Southern Current would disclose exactly which projects they intend to cancel. They said those details could help their competitors and make it harder to pursue those projects if they become financially viable later.

Both are among a group of solar developers that have asked trade officials to exclude panels used in their utility-scale projects from the tariffs. The office of the U.S. Trade Representative said it is still evaluating the requests.

Other companies are having similar problems.

Stockpiling panels

For some developers, the tariff has meant abandoning nascent markets in the American heartland that last year posted the strongest growth in installations. That growth was concentrated in states where voters supported Trump in the 2016 presidential election.

South Bend, Indiana-based developer Inovateus Solar LLC, for example, had decided three years ago to focus on emerging Midwest solar markets such as Indiana and Michigan. But the tariff sparked a shift to Massachusetts, where state renewable energy incentives make it more profitable, Chairman T.J. Kanczuzewski said.

Some firms saw the tariff coming and stockpiled panels before Trump’s announcement. For example, 174 Power Global, the development arm of Korea’s Hanwha warehoused 190 megawatts of solar panels at the end of last year for a Texas project that broke ground in January.

The company is paying more for panels for two Nevada projects that start operating this year and next, but is moving forward on construction, according to Larry Greene, who heads the firm’s development in the U.S. West.

‘A lot of robots’

Trump’s tariff has boosted the domestic manufacturing sector as intended, which over time could significantly raise U.S. panel production and reduce prices.

Panel manufacturers First Solar and JinkoSolar , for example, have announced plans to spend $800 million on projects to increase panel construction in the United States since the tariff, creating about 700 new jobs in Ohio and Florida. Last week, Korea’s Hanwha Q CELLS joined them, saying it will open a solar module factory in Georgia next year, though it did not detail job creation.

SunPower Corp, meanwhile, purchased U.S. manufacturer SolarWorld’s Oregon factory after the tariff was announced, saving that facility’s 280 jobs. The company said it plans to hire more people at the plant to expand operations, without specifying how many.

But SunPower has also said it must cut up to 250 jobs in other parts of its organization because of the tariffs.

Jobs in panel manufacturing are also limited because of increasing automation, industry experts said.

Heliene, a Canadian company in the process of opening a U.S. facility capable of producing 150 megawatts worth of panels per year, said it will employ between 130 and 140 workers in Minnesota.

“The factories are highly automated,” said Martin Pochtaruk, president of Heliene. “You don’t employ too many humans. There are a lot of robots.
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U.S. President Donald Trump “will be sticking to his guns” at the upcoming Group of Seven summit despite criticism of his trade policies from allies, one of his key economic advisers told reporters Wednesday.

“The president is at ease with all these tough issues,” said Larry Kudlow, director of the National Economic Council. “There’s always tension about something” between the United States and other G-7 members.

The comments in the White House press briefing room came shortly after both Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is hosting the G-7 summit in Quebec’s Charlevoix region, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel forecast difficult discussions on Friday and Saturday.

Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said, “This is essentially a recipe for a G-6 plus one.”

Protecting American workers

Kudlow, in his remarks, denied the United States was engaged in a trade war with its strategic partners, as well as China, but said that the United States would do what was necessary to protect American workers and industries.

Speaking to reporters in Brussels on Wednesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said it was too early to call the tariffs dispute a trade war and contended the United States was justified in demanding “fair and reciprocal” trade with its partners.

Mattis said economic disputes with allies were not expected to damage military and security relations.

Kudlow said that “the world trading system is a mess. It’s broken down.” But, he added, “Don’t blame Trump. Blame the nations that have broken away from those conditions.”

It is now clear that the United States and the other G-7 countries are “no longer singing from the same hymn book,” and that has serious ramifications for the global trading order, said Lynn Fischer Fox, a former deputy assistant secretary for policy and negotiations in the U.S. Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration.

Fischer Fox, who led negotiations for a number of trade remedy disputes during former President Barack Obama’s administration, described Trump’s approach to trade as upsetting and unpredictable.

Asked by VOA News whether the administration would respect decisions of the World Trade Organization filed against the United States over recent tariffs imposed by Trump, Kudlow replied: “We are bound by the national interests here more than anything else. International multilateral organizations are not going to determine American policy.” 

While there have been tensions between the United States and other G-7 leaders previously on strategic issues, such as the placement of nuclear weapons in Europe and the Iraq War, this rift appears far more fundamental, according to some analysts.

International rules

The United States has always followed the international rules, Fischer Fox told VOA. “And we’ve confronted other nations that use this kind of tactic of saber-rattling or hostage-taking, as it were, to try to get what they want out of the international system, outside of the rules,” she said.

Fischer Fox contended, “Violating the rules doesn’t give you a means to negotiate around the rules. If they [the Trump administration] want to negotiate the rules to be different, that’s what they should be putting on the table.”

The leaders of the other countries have no political choice now but to confront Trump, Kirkegaard, of the Peterson Institute, told VOA.

“If you do not sanction an American president who behaves like this, every president and administration after this will think that trade policy is something you can easily mess with,” Kierkegaard said.

Speaking in the Bundestag on Wednesday, Merkel warned that G-7 countries “must not keep watering down” previous summit conclusions committing the group to fair multilateral trade and rejecting protectionism.

“There must not be a compromise simply for the sake of a compromise,” Merkel said. If an acceptable agreement can’t be reached, a “chairman’s summary” by the Canadian hosts “is perhaps a more honest path — there is no sense in papering over divisions at will.”

Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, said Wednesday that steel and aluminum tariffs imposed by the United States coming into force on July 1 were illegal and that the Canadian response would be measured and proportionate.

Trump will be seeing many of the G-7 leaders again soon. He is set to meet British Prime Minister Theresa May in the United Kingdom next month. And he is also expected to attend the annual NATO summit to be held in Brussels in mid-July.
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India’s central bank raised its benchmark lending rate Wednesday to tamp down rising inflation following an increase in oil prices.

The increase of one-quarter percentage point to 6.25 percent is the first since January 2014 and comes at a time when consumer inflation is at a four-year high.

The Reserve Bank of India said it expects inflation of 4.8 to 4.9 percent in the first half of the 2018-19 financial year, which started April 1.

More rate hikes are likely in coming months, said Shilan Shah of Capital Economics in a report.

The bank said crude oil prices have been volatile, causing uncertainty to the inflation outlook. There was a 12 percent increase in the price of Indian crude basket, which was sharper than expected.

The bank forecast GDP growth for the 2018-19 financial year at 7.4 percent, up from the previous year’s 6.7 percent.

That increase has been underpinned by improved rural demand on the back of a bumper harvest and the government’s emphasis on rural housing and infrastructure.

The bank said the forecast of a normal June-September monsoon is a good sign for agricultural.
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 Britain, France and Germany have joined forces to urge the United States to exempt European companies from any sanctions the U.S. will slap on Iran after pulling out of an international nuclear agreement.

 

In a letter made public Wednesday, ministers from the three European countries told U.S. officials they “strongly regret” President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 Iran deal to which their nations also were signatories.

 

The agreement was meant to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions. Trump argued that it was insufficiently tough and has said sanctions will be imposed on any company doing business with Tehran.

 

The ministers — British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire and German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz — said they want the U.S. to “grant exemptions” for European Union companies that have been doing business with Iran since the nuclear deal took effect in 2016.  

 

“As close allies, we expect that the extraterritorial effects of U.S. secondary sanctions will not be enforced on EU entities and individuals, and the United States will thus respect our political decision and the good faith of economic operators within EU legal territory,” they said in their letter to In a letter dated Monday to U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo dated Monday.

 

They also said that Iran should not be cut out of the SWIFT system for international money transfers.

 

Many companies from Europe and the U.S. have been steadily building up their investments in Iran in the wake of the nuclear deal, particularly in the fields of pharmaceuticals, banking and oil. Any sanctions could be damaging, especially if they affect business interests in the United States.

 

The ministers reiterated their view that the deal with Iran remains the “best means” to prevent the country from becoming a nuclear power.

 

They also warned that any Iranian withdrawal from the deal would “further unsettle a region where additional conflicts would be disastrous.”

 

The letter was published during a trip to Europe by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has backed Trump in declaring the nuclear deal too soft on Iran.

 

Earlier this week, Netanyahu met with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who both reiterated their support for the accord.

 

He met British Prime Minister Theresa May on Wednesday. May said that Britain, like France and Germany, believes the nuclear deal “is the best route to preventing Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.”

 

“We will remain committed to it as long as Iran meets its obligations,” she said.

The publication of the letter came a day after Iran said it was preparing for the resumption of uranium enrichment within the limits set by the 2015 agreement. The modest steps appeared mainly aimed at signaling that Iran could resume its drive toward industrial-scale enrichment if the nuclear accord unravels.

 

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian sought to downplay the implications of the move and said it did not violate the terms of the deal.

 

“It shows a sort of irritation, and it is always dangerous to flirt with the red lines,” Le Drian said on Europe-1 radio.

 

“We must keep a sense of proportion and stick to the agreement,” he said. “And today, the agreement is not broken and Iran respects totally its commitments.”
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Mexico put tariffs on American products ranging from steel to pork and bourbon on Tuesday, retaliating against import duties on metals imposed by

President Donald Trump and taking aim at Republican strongholds ahead of U.S. congressional elections in November.

Mexico’s response further raises trade tensions between the two countries and adds a new complication to efforts to renegotiate the NAFTA trade deal between Canada, the United States and Mexico.

American pork producers, for whom Mexico is the largest export market, were dismayed by the move.

Trump last week rattled some of the closest U.S. allies by removing an exemption to tariffs on imported steel and aluminum that his administration had granted to Mexico, Canada and the European Union.

Meanwhile, Trump economic advisor Larry Kudlow revived the possibility on Tuesday that the president will seek to replace the trillion dollar North American Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with bilateral deals with Canada and Mexico, something both countries say they oppose.

Following news of the new Mexican tariffs, which take effect immediately, the peso tumbled to its weakest level since February 2017, making it one of the worst performers among major currencies.

Mexico’s retaliatory list, published in the government’s official gazette, included a 20 percent tariff on U.S. pork legs and shoulders, apples and potatoes and 20 to 25 percent duties on types of cheeses and bourbon.

A net importer of U.S. steel, Mexico is also putting 25 percent duties on a range of U.S. steel products.

Mexico’s trade negotiators designed the list, in part, to include products exported by top Republican leaders’ states, including Indiana where Vice President Mike Pence was formerly governor, according to a trade source familiar with the matter.

Bourbon-producing Kentucky is the home state of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican.

The new tariffs could also have political implications in some hotly contested races as the Republicans seek to maintain control of both chambers in Congress in November’s election, illustrating the potential perils of Trump’s aggressive efforts to set right what he sees as unfair trade balances with allies and rivals.

Midwestern worries

Iowa, where one incumbent Republican representative, Rod Blum, is seen as vulnerable, is an example of a place where Trump’s party could be hurt. The state is the top pork producing state in the United States and Mexico is its main export market by volume.

“We need trade and one of the things we’re concerned about is long-term implications that these trade issues will have on our partnerships with Mexico and Canada and other markets,” said Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig, a Republican.

“Our customers around the world start going to other parts of the world for their supplies, that is a serious problem,” he said.

Chicago Mercantile Exchange hog futures at one point fell more than 2 percent following the Mexico pork tariff announcement.

“It certainly casts a negative pall over the market,” said CME livestock futures trader Dan Norcini.

The president of the U.S. National Pork Producers Council, Jim Heimerl, said Mexico accounted for nearly 25 percent of all pork shipments last year, adding that “a 20 percent tariff eliminates our ability to compete effectively in Mexico.”

“This is devastating to my family and pork producing families across the United States,” said Heimerl, a pork producer from Johnstown, Ohio.

In Minnesota, about 14 percent of the state’s $7.1 billion of annual agricultural exports goes to Mexico, one of the state’s top export markets, said Matthew Wohlman, Minnesota Department of Agriculture deputy commissioner.

The Mexican tariffs will hit its pork, dairy and potato exports, Minnesota state officials said.

U.S. Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat from Virginia, called the new tariffs a “gut punch” to farmers in his state, who he said exported more than $68 million in pork to Mexico last year.

“The President’s trade war is going to cost Virginia ag jobs,” he wrote in a tweet.

America first

Mexico announced its response to Trump’s move last week but it did not provide details of tariff levels or a full list of products at the time.

The United States and Mexico do $600 billion in annual trade and about 16 percent of U.S. goods exports go to its southern neighbor. However, the Mexican economy relies more on trade than does the U.S. economy, with about 80 percent of its exports sold to America.

The trade fights with Mexico and Canada are part of the Trump administration’s “America First” economic agenda, which has also put Washington on a collision course with China over trade.

Washington and Beijing have threatened tit-for-tat tariffs on goods worth up to $150 billion each, as Trump has pushed Beijing to open its economy further and address the United States’ large trade deficit with China.

The United States imposed tariffs of 25 percent on imported steel and 10 percent on aluminum in March, citing national security grounds. Last week Washington said it was ending a two-month exemption it had granted to imports from Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

The dispute with Mexico over tariffs makes it more difficult to conclude talks on renegotiating NAFTA between the three countries, discussions that began last year because Trump said the deal needed to be reworked to better serve the United States. Canada has also strongly objected to the metals tariffs.

The U.S. side has linked lifting its tariffs to a successful outcome of the NAFTA negotiations.

Separately, Mexico took steps on Tuesday to make it more attractive for other countries to send it pork by opening a tariff-free quota for some pork imports. Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said his country would now “surely” look to Europe for pork products, used in many traditional dishes in Mexico.
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U.S. President Donald Trump is “seriously contemplating” trying to reach separate trade deals with Canada and Mexico instead of reshaping the more than two-decade-old North American Free Trade Agreement with both neighbors, a White House economic adviser said Tuesday.

Trump economic adviser Larry Kudlow told Fox News, “He prefers bilateral negotiations, and he is looking at two much different countries.”

The U.S., Canada and Mexico have for months engaged in talks to revise NAFTA, which has been in force since 1994. But Kudlow said separate deals “might be able to happen more rapidly.”

However, Kudlow said Trump does not plan to withdraw from the three-nation agreement.

“He is seriously contemplating a shift in the NAFTA negotiations … [and] he asked me to convey this,” Kudlow said. The adviser said Trump “believed bilateral is always better. He hates large treaties.”

Trump has long assailed multinational trade deals and within days of assuming power last year, withdrew the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership with 11 other Pacific rim nations.

On Monday, he said on Twitter, “The U.S. has made such bad trade deals over so many years that we can only WIN!”

He declared, “China already charges a tax of 16% on soybeans. Canada has all sorts of trade barriers on our Agricultural products. Not acceptable!”

Trump contended, “Farmers have not been doing well for 15 years. Mexico, Canada, China and others have treated them unfairly. By the time I finish trade talks, that will change. Big trade barriers against U.S. farmers, and other businesses, will finally be broken. Massive trade deficits no longer!”

The NAFTA talks have stalled on U.S. demands to increase American components in duty-free NAFTA autos, as well as its argument that any new agreement end after five years.

Kudlow said he told top Canadian officials Monday about Trump’s hope for bilateral trade talks and is awaiting for reaction from Ottawa.

“The important thought is he may be moving quickly towards these bilateral discussions instead of as a whole,” Kudlow said.

Trump’s trade talks with China, Mexico, Canada and the European Union have proved contentious. The U.S. leader last week drew the ire of Canada, Mexico and the EU by imposing tariffs on their aluminum and steel exports.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the tariffs “insulting and unacceptable.” In a weekend television interview, Kudlow called the U.S.-Canada trade dispute a “family quarrel.”

 
…

Starbucks Corp, the world’s biggest coffee chain, said on Monday Executive Chairman Howard Schultz is stepping down, effective June 26.

Schultz, who has been with Starbucks for nearly four decades, is credited with turning the company into a popular household name and growing it from 11 stores to more than 28,000 in 77 countries.

Last year, Schultz stepped down as chief executive officer to become executive chairman, handing the top job to Kevin Johnson.

Most recently, he was involved in steering the company through an anti-bias training program that was kickstarted after a Philadelphia cafe manager’s call to police resulted in the arrests of two black men who were waiting for a friend.

Starbucks’ board named Myron Ullman, who was previously chairman and CEO of struggling retailer J.C. Penney Co, as its new chair and Mellody Hobson vice chair effective upon Schultz’s retirement.

Schultz will also resign from Starbucks’ board and will be named chairman emeritus, the company said in a statement.
…

German chemicals and pharmaceuticals giant Bayer will discard the name Monsanto when it takes over the controversial US seeds and pesticides producer this week, it said Monday.

But Bayer executives insisted Monsanto practices rejected by many environmentalists, including genetic modification of seeds and deployment of “crop protection” technologies like pesticides, were vital to help feed a growing world population.

“The company name is and will remain Bayer. Monsanto will no longer be a company name,” chief executive Werner Baumann told journalists during a telephone conference.

Bayer’s $63 billion (54 billion euro) buyout of Monsanto — one of the largest in German corporate history — is set to close Thursday, birthing a global giant with 115,000 employees and revenues of some 45 billion euros.

Bosses plan to name the merged agrichemical division Bayer Crop Science once the merger is complete, German business newspaper Handelsblatt reported, citing “industry sources”.

The Monsanto brand “was an issue for some time for Monsanto management,” noted Liam Condon, president of Bayer’s crop science division, adding that the US firm’s employees were “not fixated on the Monsanto brand” but “proud of what they’ve achieved.”

Weedkiller arms race

Producing high-tech genetically modified seeds, many designed to grow crops resistant to its proprietary pesticides, Monsanto has been a target for environmentalist protests and lawsuits over harm to health and the environment for decades.

“It’s understandable that Bayer wants to avoid having bought Monsanto’s negative image with the billions it has spent on the firm,” said Greenpeace campaigner Dirk Zimmermann.

“More important than giving up the Monsanto name would be a fundamental transformation in the new mega-company’s policies,” he added, accusing Bayer of having “no interest in developing future-proof, sustainable solutions for agriculture.”

Activists fear the firm’s addition to Bayer will further reduce competition in the hotly-contested agrichemical sector, limiting farmers’ and consumers’ choices if they want to avoid GM and chemically treated crops.

What’s more, in recent years weeds have begun to emerge that are resistant to products like Monsanto staple glyphosate, marketed as Roundup alongside “Roundup-ready” seeds beginning in the 1990s.

As agrichemical firms scramble to respond with new pesticides and resistant seeds, there are fears of an arms race with ever-more-potent weedkillers.

Some scientists already suspect glyphosate could cause cancer, with a 2015 World Health Organization study determining it was “probably carcinogenic” — although Bayer and other defenders of the chemical have contested the research.

In 2017, attempts to block the European Union’s five-year renewal of its approval for the weedkiller were unsuccessful.

But activists are lobbying governments and France has vowed to outlaw the substance within three years.

When launching the Monsanto takeover bid, Bayer also promised it would not introduce genetically modified crops in Europe.

“We will listen to our critics and work together where we find common ground,” Baumann said, but added that “agriculture is too important to allow ideological differences to bring progress to a standstill”.

With the world population set to reach almost 10 billion people by 2050, Bayer argues its products and methods are needed to meet demand for food.

‘Number one in seeds’

Bayer has put massive resources behind the deal, raising $57 billion in financing including a new share issue worth six billion euros announced Sunday.

It will also sell large parts of its existing agrichemical and crop seeds business to BASF in concessions to competition authorities on both sides of the Atlantic.

Once the buyout and the sales to BASF are completed, Leverkusen-based Bayer’s crop science business plus Monsanto will account for around half its turnover, with the remainder coming from pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter health products.

At around 19.7 billion euros in 2017, Monsanto and Bayer’s combined agriculture sales outweighed those of competitors ChemChina, DowDuPont and BASF, according to figures provided by Bayer.

“We estimate that Bayer will become number one in seeds and number two in crop protection globally” following the merger, analysts at Standard and Poor’s wrote Monday.

Nevertheless, the ratings agency downgraded its score for Bayer’s debt from “A-” to “BBB,” while upgrading the outlook to “stable”.

“Bayer’s stronger business position in agriculture products… does not fully offset the increased debt in its capital structure,” the analysts wrote.

 

 

 

 

 
…

Institutional investors with $26 trillion in assets under management called on Group of Seven leaders on Monday to phase out the use of coal in power generation to help limit climate change, despite strong opposition from Washington.

Government plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions were too weak to limit warming as agreed by world leaders at a Paris summit in 2015, they wrote. U.S. President Donald Trump announced a year ago that he was pulling out of the pact.

“The global shift to clean energy is under way, but much more needs to be done by governments,” the group of 288 investors wrote in a statement before the G7 summit in Canada on June 8-9.

Signatories included Allianz Global Investors, Aviva Investors, DWS, HSBC Global Asset Management, Nomura Asset Management, Australian Super, HESTA and some major U.S. pension funds including CalPERS, it said.

As part of action to slow climate change, the investors called on governments to “phase out thermal coal power worldwide by set deadlines,” to phase out fossil fuel subsidies and to “put a meaningful price on carbon.”

The investors also urged governments to strengthen national plans for cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and to ensure that companies improve climate-related financial reporting.

Stephanie Pfeifer, CEO of the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGC), said it was the first time that such a broad group of investors had called for a phase-out of thermal coal, used in power generation.

“There is a lot more momentum in the investor community” to put pressure on governments, she told Reuters. The IIGC was among backers of the statement, delivered to G7 governments and to the United Nations.

G7 nations Canada, Britain, France and Italy are members of a “Powering Past Coal” alliance of almost 30 nations set up last year and which seeks to halt use of coal power by 2030. Japan, Germany and the United States are not members.

The investors wrote that countries and companies that implement the Paris climate agreement “will see significant economic benefits and attract increased investment.” U.S. gross domestic product was $18.6 trillion in 2016, World Bank data show.

Trump doubts scientific findings that heatwaves, downpours and rising sea levels are linked to man-made greenhouse gas emissions and wants to bolster the U.S. fossil fuel industry.

Worldwide, coal is now used to generate almost 40 percent of electricity.
…

British civil servants have warned of shortages of food, fuel and medicines within weeks if the U.K. leaves the European Union without a trade deal, a newspaper reported Sunday.

The Sunday Times said government officials have modeled three potential scenarios for a “no deal” Brexit: mild, severe and “Armageddon.”

It said under the “severe” scenario, the English Channel ferry port of Dover would “collapse on day one” and supermarkets and hospitals would soon run short of supplies.

 

Britain wants to strike a deal on future trade relations with the EU before it officially leaves the bloc on March 29, 2019, but officials are also drawing up plans for negotiations ending without an agreement.

 

The U.K.’s Department for Exiting the European Union rejected the downbeat scenario, saying it was drawing up no-deal plans but was confident “none of this would come to pass.”

 

Britain and the EU are aiming to strike an overall Brexit agreement by October, so parliaments in other EU nations have time to ratify it before Britain leaves the bloc.

 

But British Prime Minister Theresa May’s Conservative government is split between ministers who favor a clean-break “hard Brexit,” that would leave Britain freer to strike new trade deals around the world, and those who want to keep the country closely aligned to the EU, Britain’s biggest trading partner.

 

 EU leaders are frustrated with what they see as a lack of firm proposals from the U.K. over how to resolve major issues around customs arrangements and the status of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. That will be the U.K.’s only land border with the EU after Britain leaves the bloc.

 

Irish Deputy Prime Minister Simon Coveney said Saturday that the U.K. must produce “written proposals” for the border within two weeks, ahead of a June 28-29 EU summit.

 

 British Home Secretary Sajid Javid said Sunday that the British government would have “a good set of proposals” to submit to the bloc at its June meeting.

 

 

 

 
…

China has warned that any agreements with Washington in their talks on settling a sprawling trade dispute “will not take effect” if threatened U.S. sanctions including tariff hikes go ahead.

The statement Sunday came shortly after delegations led by U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and China’s top economic official, Vice Premier Liu He, held another round of talks on China’s pledge to narrow its trade surplus with the United States by purchasing more American goods. 

The Chinese statement said the two sides made “positive and concrete progress,” but neither side released details.

The statement said, “If the United States introduces trade sanctions including increasing tariffs, all the economic and trade achievements negotiated by the two parties will not take effect.”

Ross said U.S. and Chinese officials have discussed specific American export items Beijing might buy as part of its pledge to narrow its trade surplus with the United States.

The two sides began a new round of talks in Beijing this weekend aimed at settling a simmering trade dispute.

Ross gave no details at the start of his meeting Sunday with Liu, China’s top economic official. But Chinese envoys promised after the last high-level meeting in Washington in mid-May to buy more American farm goods and energy products.

President Donald Trump is pressing Beijing to narrow its politically volatile surplus in trade in goods with the United States, which reached a record $375.2 billion last year. He’s threatening to hike duties on up to $150 billion of Chinese imports.

“Our meetings so far have been friendly and frank, and covered some useful topics about specific export items,” Ross said.

Ross was accompanied by agricultural, treasury and trade officials. Liu’s delegation included China’s central bank governor and commerce minister.

There was no indication whether the talks also would take up American complaints that Beijing steals or pressures foreign companies regarding their technology. The White House renewed a threat this week to hike duties on $50 billion of Chinese technology-related goods over that dispute.

Private sector analysts say that while Beijing is willing to compromise on its trade surplus, it will resist changes that might threaten plans to transform China into a global technology competitor.

Ross had a working dinner Saturday evening with Liu, also at the same guesthouse in Beijing.

China has promised to “significantly increase” purchases of farm goods, energy and other products and services. Still, Beijing resisted pressure to commit to a specific target of narrowing its annual surplus with the United States by $200 billion.
…

China has warned that any agreements with Washington in their talks on settling a sprawling trade dispute “will not take effect” if threatened U.S. sanctions including tariff hikes go ahead.

The statement Sunday came shortly after delegations led by U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and China’s top economic official, Vice Premier Liu He, held another round of talks on China’s pledge to narrow its trade surplus with the United States by purchasing more American goods. 

The Chinese statement said the two sides made “positive and concrete progress,” but neither side released details.

The statement said, “If the United States introduces trade sanctions including increasing tariffs, all the economic and trade achievements negotiated by the two parties will not take effect.”

Ross said U.S. and Chinese officials have discussed specific American export items Beijing might buy as part of its pledge to narrow its trade surplus with the United States.

The two sides began a new round of talks in Beijing this weekend aimed at settling a simmering trade dispute.

Ross gave no details at the start of his meeting Sunday with Liu, China’s top economic official. But Chinese envoys promised after the last high-level meeting in Washington in mid-May to buy more American farm goods and energy products.

President Donald Trump is pressing Beijing to narrow its politically volatile surplus in trade in goods with the United States, which reached a record $375.2 billion last year. He’s threatening to hike duties on up to $150 billion of Chinese imports.

“Our meetings so far have been friendly and frank, and covered some useful topics about specific export items,” Ross said.

Ross was accompanied by agricultural, treasury and trade officials. Liu’s delegation included China’s central bank governor and commerce minister.

There was no indication whether the talks also would take up American complaints that Beijing steals or pressures foreign companies regarding their technology. The White House renewed a threat this week to hike duties on $50 billion of Chinese technology-related goods over that dispute.

Private sector analysts say that while Beijing is willing to compromise on its trade surplus, it will resist changes that might threaten plans to transform China into a global technology competitor.

Ross had a working dinner Saturday evening with Liu, also at the same guesthouse in Beijing.

China has promised to “significantly increase” purchases of farm goods, energy and other products and services. Still, Beijing resisted pressure to commit to a specific target of narrowing its annual surplus with the United States by $200 billion.
…

China is warning the United States any trade and business agreements between the two countries will be void if President Donald Trump carries out his threats to impose tariff hikes and other trade measures.

The warning came after U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and Chinese Deputy Prime Minister Liu He ended a new round of talks Sunday in Beijing aimed at settling a simmering trade dispute, in which Beijing pledged to buy more American products to narrow its trade surplus with the United States.  The Chinese trade surplus reached $375 billion last year.

No joint statement was issued and neither side released details.

“Our meetings so far have been friendly and frank,” Ross said at the start of the talks, “and covered some useful topics about specific export items” China might buy.

Chinese envoys had promised after the last high-level meeting in Washington in mid-May to buy more American farm goods and energy products.

Ross was accompanied by agricultural, treasury and trade officials.

 

Liu’s delegation included China’s central bank governor and commerce minister.

There was no indication whether the talks also took up American complaints that Beijing steals from or pressures foreign companies.

Trump is threatening to hike duties on up to $150 billion of Chinese imports, with Beijing vowing to retaliate in kind.

The White House renewed a threat last week to hike duties on $50 billion of Chinese technology-related goods in that dispute.

The state-run Chinese newspaper Global Times contended in an editorial that, “Tariffs and expanding exports – the United States can’t have both.  China-U.S. trade negotiations have to dig up the two sides’ greatest number of common interests, and cannot be tilted toward unilateral U.S. interests.”

While the U.S.-China trade and tariff disputes remain unresolved, Trump last week imposed new tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from the European Union, Canada and Mexico, angering three key U.S. allies who vowed to retaliate by imposing new duties on American goods.

 
…

Britain will not sign a trade agreement with the United States that is not in the country’s best interests, Trade Minister Liam Fox said Saturday after European Union officials filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization over stiff U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.

“If we can’t come to an agreement that we believe is in the interests of the United Kingdom, then we wouldn’t be signing any trade agreement,” Fox said Saturday in an interview with BBC radio.

Fox’s comments came one day after European Union officials submitted a formal complaint to the WTO, the first in a series of retaliatory actions, including possible tariffs, against the U.S. Fox said the tariffs are “illegal” and that British Prime Minister Theresa May would raise the issue at the Group of Seven meeting next week in Canada.

Trans-Atlantic and North American trade tensions escalated when the U.S. imposed on Friday a 25 percent tariff on steel imports and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum imports from the European Union, Canada and Mexico. The U.S. also negotiated quotas or volume limits on other countries, such as South Korea, Argentina, Australia and Brazil, instead of tariffs.

In a separate dispute, China is prepared to target billions of dollars in U.S. products, many of which come from America’s agricultural heartland, where Trump enjoys strong voter support.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross arrived in Beijing Saturday in an attempt to avert an all-out trade war between the world’s two largest economies. On China’s target list are U.S. soybean farmers, who export about 60-percent of their soybeans to China.

A dairy farmer who also grows soybeans in the midwestern state of Nebraska, Ben Steffen, is angry about the U.S. tariffs “because it hits me in my pocketbook from multiple angles.”

California farmer Jeff Colombini, who grows walnuts, cherries and apples, is concerned about the financial damage a trade war could bring.

“With these tariffs, its going to make the product[s] too expensive for the consumers in Mexico and in Canada and in the EU,” he said. “I have 200 employees, and they depend on the success of this operation for their jobs and to feed and clothe their families.”

The imposition of the tariffs is also not popular with some members of Congress, including those from Trump’s own party, whose states are dependent on exports.

“Imposing steel and aluminum tariffs on our most important trading partners is the wrong approach and represents an abuse of authority intended only for national security purposes,” said Bob Corker of Tennessee, who is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“You don’t treat allies the same way you treat opponents,” Republican Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska said on Twitter. “Blanket protectionism is a big part of why we had a Great Depression. ‘Make America Great Again’ shouldn’t mean ‘Make America 1929 Again.’”

Tennessee has three major auto assembly plants. Nebraska is a significant exporter of cattle, corn, soybeans and hogs.

Mexico said, in response, it will penalize U.S. imports, including pork bellies, apples, grapes, cheeses and flat steel.

“There’s a reason why” the countries are carefully selecting which American products to target in response, said William Reinsch, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“Most of bourbon is made in Kentucky, which is the state of the Senate majority leader. Harley Davidsons are made in Wisconsin, which is the state of the speaker of the House,” Reinsch told VOA News. “Usually when other countries retaliate, and the Chinese have done something similar, is they’re good at maximizing political pain by picking out products that are made in places where people are politically important.”

“Tariffs on steel and aluminum imports are a tax hike on Americans and will have damaging consequences for consumers, manufacturers and workers,” said Republican Orrin Hatch, who chairs the Senate’s finance committee and is a longtime advocate of breaking down trade barriers.

Expected higher prices for U.S. consumers on some products is only one side of the equation, said Ross, who noted that steel and aluminum makers in the U.S. are adding employment and opening facilities as a result of the U.S. government action.

“You can create a few jobs, however, you’re going to lose more in the process,” as consuming industries will be placed at a disadvantage of paying more for raw materials compared to their foreign competitors, Simon Lester, trade policy analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute, told VOA News.

 
…

Britain will not sign a trade agreement with the United States that is not in the country’s best interests, Trade Minister Liam Fox said Saturday after European Union officials filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization over stiff U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.

“If we can’t come to an agreement that we believe is in the interests of the United Kingdom, then we wouldn’t be signing any trade agreement,” Fox said Saturday in an interview with BBC radio.

Fox’s comments came one day after European Union officials submitted a formal complaint to the WTO, the first in a series of retaliatory actions, including possible tariffs, against the U.S. Fox said the tariffs are “illegal” and that British Prime Minister Theresa May would raise the issue at the Group of Seven meeting next week in Canada.

Trans-Atlantic and North American trade tensions escalated when the U.S. imposed on Friday a 25 percent tariff on steel imports and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum imports from the European Union, Canada and Mexico. The U.S. also negotiated quotas or volume limits on other countries, such as South Korea, Argentina, Australia and Brazil, instead of tariffs.

In a separate dispute, China is prepared to target billions of dollars in U.S. products, many of which come from America’s agricultural heartland, where Trump enjoys strong voter support.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross arrived in Beijing Saturday in an attempt to avert an all-out trade war between the world’s two largest economies. On China’s target list are U.S. soybean farmers, who export about 60-percent of their soybeans to China.

A dairy farmer who also grows soybeans in the midwestern state of Nebraska, Ben Steffen, is angry about the U.S. tariffs “because it hits me in my pocketbook from multiple angles.”

California farmer Jeff Colombini, who grows walnuts, cherries and apples, is concerned about the financial damage a trade war could bring.

“With these tariffs, its going to make the product[s] too expensive for the consumers in Mexico and in Canada and in the EU,” he said. “I have 200 employees, and they depend on the success of this operation for their jobs and to feed and clothe their families.”

The imposition of the tariffs is also not popular with some members of Congress, including those from Trump’s own party, whose states are dependent on exports.

“Imposing steel and aluminum tariffs on our most important trading partners is the wrong approach and represents an abuse of authority intended only for national security purposes,” said Bob Corker of Tennessee, who is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“You don’t treat allies the same way you treat opponents,” Republican Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska said on Twitter. “Blanket protectionism is a big part of why we had a Great Depression. ‘Make America Great Again’ shouldn’t mean ‘Make America 1929 Again.’”

Tennessee has three major auto assembly plants. Nebraska is a significant exporter of cattle, corn, soybeans and hogs.

Mexico said, in response, it will penalize U.S. imports, including pork bellies, apples, grapes, cheeses and flat steel.

“There’s a reason why” the countries are carefully selecting which American products to target in response, said William Reinsch, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“Most of bourbon is made in Kentucky, which is the state of the Senate majority leader. Harley Davidsons are made in Wisconsin, which is the state of the speaker of the House,” Reinsch told VOA News. “Usually when other countries retaliate, and the Chinese have done something similar, is they’re good at maximizing political pain by picking out products that are made in places where people are politically important.”

“Tariffs on steel and aluminum imports are a tax hike on Americans and will have damaging consequences for consumers, manufacturers and workers,” said Republican Orrin Hatch, who chairs the Senate’s finance committee and is a longtime advocate of breaking down trade barriers.

Expected higher prices for U.S. consumers on some products is only one side of the equation, said Ross, who noted that steel and aluminum makers in the U.S. are adding employment and opening facilities as a result of the U.S. government action.

“You can create a few jobs, however, you’re going to lose more in the process,” as consuming industries will be placed at a disadvantage of paying more for raw materials compared to their foreign competitors, Simon Lester, trade policy analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute, told VOA News.

 
…