American taxes on steel: Brazil seeks to negotiate

This article was automatically translated from HIBAPRESS, the Arabic version:

Hibapress

Brazil, a second steel exporter to the United States, announced on Wednesday that it sought to negotiate, without considering reprisals at first, after the entry into force of customs duties of 25 % imposed by Donald Trump on steel and aluminum.

“President Lula said: ‘Lots of calm at the moment’. We have already negotiated in conditions much more difficult than these, “said finance minister Fernando Haddad, after a meeting in Brasilia with representatives of the steel sector, who presented him proposals aimed at protecting the Brazilian industry.

The Minister added that Brazilian entrepreneurs had highlighted arguments stressing that this taxation would also be detrimental for the United States, without however entering into the details of concrete proposals.

Haddad also insisted that the United States had a “bad diagnosis” concerning this tax and assured that the Brazilian government was going to submit technical arguments to challenge the measure.

The new customs duties of 25 % on steel and aluminum have now been effective, since midnight, for all supplier countries in the United States. This measure directly strikes Brazilian exports, while the United States is one of the largest Brazilian steel buyers. In 2022, according to the Brazil Institute of Steel Institute, almost 49 % of Brazilian steel exports were intended in the United States.

Experts believe that the tax could have significant consequences for the Brazilian steel industry, without, however, caused a major impact on the overall economy of the country.

“The United States has nothing to gain, because our business is balanced,” said the minister. He also mentioned that the Brazilian steel sector worried about the Chinese steel entrance to the Brazilian market, which may require a more unilateral defense concerning imports.

Haddad said the Ministry of Finance will prepare a technical note, based on the proposals for Brazilian steel industry, which will be subject to the vice-president Geraldo Alckmin, also Minister of Development, to guide negotiations with the United States.

Last week, Brazil announced that it has started a dialogue with the American administration on this issue. During a telephone conversation on Friday, the Brazilian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mauro Vieira, and the representative of the White House in Commerce, Jamieson Greer, agreed to create a “working group (…) to deal with tariff issues,” said the Brazilian Foreign Ministry.