Washington, China has agreed to cut tariffs on cars it imports from the US, President Donald Trump has said, a day after he negotiated a ceasefire in the trade war with Beijing.
“China has agreed to reduce and remove tariffs on cars coming into China from the US. Currently the tariff is 40 per cent,” Trump tweeted on Sunday.
But the US leader didn’t specify when the change would happen or what the new tariff level would be, CNN reported on Monday. Also, the Chinese government made no mention of cutting car tariffs.
Trump’s announcement came shortly after he and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping announced a breakthrough during the G-20 summit in Buenos Aires on Saturday, temporarily pausing the trade row between the world’s two largest economies that had seen tit-for-tat tariffs imposed on each other’s products.
As part of the weekend deal, Trump agreed to hold off on his threat to impose 25 per cent tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods from January 1, leaving them at the current 10 per cent rate.
In return, Beijing will purchase “very substantial” amount of agricultural, energy, industrial and other products from Washington.
Earlier this year, China lowered its tariffs on foreign car imports from 25 per cent to 15 per cent. However, it later imposed new additional tariffs of 25 per cent on American-made passenger vehicles in response to Trump raising the tariff on Chinese autos from 2.5 per cent to 27.5 per cent.
The US leader called his deal with Xi as “incredible”. “It goes down, certainly – if it happens, it goes down as one of the largest deals ever made,” he told reporters.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had said the tariffs on Chinese goods could be gradually removed if Beijing agreed to certain concessions, according to the New York Times.
The agreement also came as Chinese auto manufacturers are aiming to enter the US market within the next couple of years.
China is currently the world’s largest manufacturer of cars and car parts as well as the world’s biggest market for cars.
