US President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced a 10% baseline tariff on goods imported from St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) and all other countries around the world.
He claimed that Kingstown levies a similar amount on imports from the United States.
SVG was among several Caribbean countries on which Trump imposed tariffs as he announced tariffs on countries around the world.
In addition to the baseline tariff, Trump announced individualised “reciprocal” tariffs on various countries, including 34% on imports from China, 20% on the European Union, 32% on Taiwan, and 38% on Guyana.
The US’ two largest trading partners, Canada and Mexico, were not included in the announcement.
SVG exports to the United States in 2024 were worth US$8.4 million, according to the United Nations COMTRADE database.
The database showed that the value of SVG imports from the United States in 2024 was US$143.22 million.
The 10% baseline tariff takes effect on Saturday, at 12:01 a.m. Washington, DC time while the “reciprocal” tariffs come into effect on Wednesday, April 9.
Trump announced the tariffs at the White House moments before signing an executive order bringing them into effect.
“Well, we have some very, very good news today,” he said. “My fellow Americans, this is Liberation Day. … April 2 2025, will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn, the day America’s destiny was reclaimed, and the day that we began to make America wealthy again…”
The US president said that for decades the country has been “looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike.
“American steel workers, auto workers, farmers and skilled craftsmen … they really suffered gravely. They watched in anguish as foreign leaders have stolen our jobs, foreign cheaters have ransacked our factories, and foreign scavengers have torn apart our once beautiful American dream.”
He said the United States and its taxpayers have been “ripped off for more than 50 years, but it is not going to happen anymore”, adding that he was signing an executive order on reciprocal tariffs.
“Reciprocal. That means they do it to us, and we do it to them. Very simple; can’t get any simpler than that.
“This is one of the most important days, in my opinion, in American history. It’s our declaration of economic independence. For years, hard-working American citizens were forced to sit on the sidelines as other nations got rich and powerful, much of it at our expense. But now it’s our turn to prosper, and in so doing, use trillions and trillions of dollars to reduce our taxes and pay down our national debt, and it will all happen very quickly,” Trump said.
He said that with the tariffs, “we are finally going to be able to make America great again, greater than ever before.
“Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country, and you see it happening already. We will supercharge our domestic industrial base. We will pry open foreign markets and break down foreign trade barriers, and ultimately, more production at home will mean stronger competition and lower prices for consumers.
“This will be, indeed, the golden age of America. It’s coming back, and we’re going to come back very strongly,” Trump said.
In the executive order, Trump said he had found that “underlying conditions, including a lack of reciprocity in our bilateral trade relationships, disparate tariff rates and non-tariff barriers, and U.S. trading partners’ economic policies that suppress domestic wages and consumption, as indicated by large and persistent annual U.S. goods trade deficits, constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and economy of the United States.
That threat has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States in the domestic economic policies of key trading partners and structural imbalances in the global trading system. I hereby declare a national emergency with respect to this threat.”
SVG government is already in the pockets of the IMF and World Bank. Now Trump wants to clamp the strangle hold on the people of SVG. People here are dotish and not so very well educated or just plain blind, mentally. After black people lived in poverty for eons and don’t know anything else but poverty, they can’t change. They will sell their mother for peanuts and starve after they have eaten it.