Trade Retaliation will Impact US Dry Bean Exports to the EU

Several nations, including some of our most important trade partners have announced plans and have published detailed lists of punitive tariffs that will be applied to U.S. agricultural imports in response to the U.S.’ decision to impose steel and aluminum tariffs of 25% and 10% respectively. This comes in the midst of an already challenging trade environment for the U.S. with a stalemate in the NAFTA renegotiations and a trade war with China over intellectual property. While Canada, Mexico, the EU, Turkey, and China have all published their retaliation lists, only the EU and China have announced specific punitive tariffs on US dry bean imports. As China’s total annual US dry bean imports are less than 100 MT, trade retaliation from the EU is the primary concern. According to the list published in the EU Federal Gazette, if the U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum are not lifted, the EU will impose a retaliatory 25% import tariff on Kidney and Navy beans.

USDBC has signed several letters in conjunction with the U.S. agricultural trade community asking for a permanent exemption to the steel and aluminum tariffs for our trade partners, emphasizing the negative impact on the U.S. agricultural economy. Additionally, USDBC is working together with other global trade partners and key customers in the EU to emphasize how this retaliatory action hurts the bottom line for the EU industry as well. We continue to hope that a resolution will be reached with our trade partners and we will be working to that end.