President Donald Trump of the United States issued a broad executive order that imposed a 15 percent import tariff on Nigeria and several other African nations.
On Thursday, the White House declared the updated reciprocal tariff rates.
Trump had earlier in April imposed 14 percent tariffs on Nigeria as part of his sweeping sanctions on international trading partners.
Later, the deadline for the “reciprocal” tariffs was pushed back to August 1 for a period of 90 days to give time to negotiate specific trade agreements.
Even with these extensions, the majority of negotiations ended without new agreements, which led to the implementation of higher tariffs under Trump’s updated worldwide plan.
Despite desperate attempts by a number of leaders on both sides of the divide, the United States failed to negotiate a single trade agreement with any African nation.
During that time, Trump placed travel restrictions on a number of African countries as authorities attempted to circumvent the levies.
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As the policy developed, Nigeria was added after first being left out.
Nigeria’s foreign minister, Yusuf Tuggar, stated that West African countries wanted to increase trade with the United States but pointed to the travel restrictions as a roadblock.
The distribution of the updated taxes is shown below.
10%: The United Kingdom, the Falkland Islands, and every other nation not on the executive order list
Afghanistan, Angola, Bolivia, Botswana, Cameroon, Chad, Costa Rica, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ecuador, Equatorial Guinea, Fiji, Ghana, Guyana, Iceland, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Lesotho, Liechtenstein, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Nauru, New Zealand, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway, Papua New Guinea, South Korea, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Uganda, Vanuatu, Venezuela, Zambia, Zimbabwe
Nicaragua accounts for 18%.
19%: Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia, and the Philippines
Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam make up 20%.
25%: Kazakhstan, India, Brunei, Moldova, and Tunisia
30%: South Africa, Libya, Algeria, and Bosnia and Herzegovina
35%: Serbia and Iraq
Switzerland (39%).
40%: Myanmar (Burma) and Laos
Syria (41%).
The Trump administration is still negotiating with China, which has been embroiled in a lengthy trade dispute with the US.
Mexico was struck with a 25 percent fentanyl duty, a 25 percent automobile tariff, and a 50 percent steel, aluminum, and copper tariff, all of which go into force in 90 days, while Canada was subject to a 35 percent tariff.
A 10% tax was imposed on Brazil.
But on Thursday, the South American country was hit with a separate 40 percent tariff. This implies that it must contend with a new 50% rate.
