Govt. to meet with exporters on impact of Trump’s tariffs-President Ali

Govt. to meet with exporters on impact of Trump’s tariffs—-President Ali

Apr 10, 2025 News

Kaieteur News- President Irfaan Ali has disclosed that the Government of Guyana will meet with local exporters before the end of the week to gauge the impact of United States 38% reciprocal tariffs on Guyanese exports would have on them.

Govt. to meet with exporters on impact of Trump’s tariffs----President Ali

President Irfaan Ali

Last Wednesday, United States President Donald Trump announced a 38% tariff on goods from Guyana and stated that this country is charging the US 76% tariffs in currency manipulation and trade barriers.

However, in a stunning reversal, U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would temporarily lower the hefty duties he had just imposed on dozens of countries while further ramping up pressure on China, sending U.S. stocks rocketing higher.

Trump’s turnabout, which came less than 24 hours after steep new tariffs kicked in on most trading partners, followed the most intense episode of financial market volatility since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Reuters reported on Wednesday. The upheaval erased trillions of dollars from stock markets and led to an unsettling surge in U.S. government bond yields that appeared to catch Trump’s attention.

Meanwhile, speaking on the sidelines of the Local Content Summit on Tuesday, President Ali said, “As we said earlier, the US is a strong partner of Guyana and we have a lot of discussions and conversations that are ongoing and I’m not going to go further at this point.” He continued, “I have asked the Minister of Finance and I know our Vice President too will be meeting with our exporters before the end of this week to have a sense from them as to the current impact or the current circumstances, but there is some good conversations going on.”

At his last press conference, Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo explained that the move was not unexpected, given that Trump campaigned on addressing trade imbalances between the US and various countries.

Further, he noted that in Guyana’s case, the US trade figures suggest a substantial trade surplus that Guyana exports more to the US than it imported, while Guyana’s data differs significantly. As a result, he assured Guyanese exporters that the government will seek to clarify the difference in the trade surplus data with the aim of potentially lowering the tariff. Using information from the United Nations COMTRADE, Jagdeo pointed out a significant difference between Guyana’s trade surplus figures versus the figures reported by the US. For 2024, Guyana’s report to UN COMTRADE states that the country exported US$3.3 billion to the US and imported US$2.56 billion, leaving a trade surplus of US$799 million. However, the US report to the UN COMTRADE presents drastically different figures, showing Guyana’s exports to the US for 2024 were US$5.5 billion and imports were only US$1.3 billion, resulting in a trade surplus of US$4.1 billion. “So, clearly there is room for us to work with the US partners to clarify this information,” Jagdeo said. He had assured exporters that the government will work with them to mitigate the impact of the tariff and noted that there is no need to panic. He said, “I want to assure all of our exporters that we’ll work with them as we learn more of the issue. We will be meeting with them, working with them to ensure that they can continue to access the US markets and other markets in the world and they will have the full support of the government of Guyana and so that we do not lose economic, welfare, or welfare associated with the loss of economic output, this is like people losing jobs etcetera in the export industries.”

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