After weeks and months of worrying, B.C. politicians expressed cautious relief Wednesday following the announcement that Canada wouldn’t be charged additional tariffs as part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day.” Read More
Canada is still being charged 25 per cent tariffs on steel, aluminum and non-USMCA goods, and is facing a similar level of tariffs on automobiles.
Canada is still being charged 25 per cent tariffs on steel, aluminum and non-USMCA goods, and is facing a similar level of tariffs on automobiles.
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After weeks and months of worrying, B.C. politicians expressed cautious relief Wednesday following the announcement that Canada wouldn’t be charged additional tariffs as part of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day.”
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While most countries will be charged at least 10 per cent tariffs as part of Trump’s protectionist plan to raise money for the U.S. and bring manufacturing back stateside, Mexico and Canada will be exempt from any additional levies.
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The reveal came as a surprise due to the American president spending months targeting Canada’s trade deficit with the U.S., saying his country doesn’t need anything its northern neighbour sells, from lumber to dairy to cars. He has also repeatedly argued that Canada should become the “51st State” and threatened to use “economic force” to bring that about.
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Instead, Trump turned his ire to much of the rest of the world on Wednesday, holding up a list of over 50 countries, plus the 27 countries of the European Union, that he said will be charged tariff rates of half what they’re deemed to charge the U.S.
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That includes a 34 per cent rate for China, which is on top of the 20 per cent it’s already being charged, a 26 per cent rate on India, a 24 per cent rate on Japan and a 20 per cent rate on the European Union.
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Some other countries got hit even harder with Cambodia facing a 49 per cent tariff and Laos right behind at 48 per cent.
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Ravi Kahlon, chairman of the province’s cabinet committee on U.S. tariffs, told reporters at the legislature that he is still analyzing Trump’s announcement and that the unpredictability of the American president means that Canada could still be targeted in the days and weeks to come.
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“It’s troubling because we heard from the president that he was going to build a wall, and what he’s announced today is an economic wall around the country, and we’re going to continue to see what comes from it,” he said.
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“The relationship is still fundamentally changed, and we’re going to need to continue to do things to strengthen our economy and diversify our trade opportunities.”
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B.C. Conservative Leader John Rustad said he had been bracing for more of a tariff hit from the U.S. but the fact that Canada got away relatively unscathed doesn’t change how vulnerable the country is to threats from its largest trading partner.
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He said the province needs to work harder to get away from its dependence on American food and energy and construct more pipelines to get Canadian oil-and-gas to Asia off B.C.’s West Coast.
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“We need to start thinking strongly as Canadians,” Rustad said.
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Of course, it isn’t like Canada has got away scot free with the country still being charged 25 per cent tariffs on all exports to the U.S. that aren’t compliant with the USMCA trade deal, except for energy and potash, which are charged at 10 per cent, as well as separate 25 per cent tariffs on all steel and aluminum exports.