Swiss raise concerns about Trump’s tariff hike proposals

By John Revill

BERN (Reuters) – Switzerland has raised concerns about plans by incoming U.S. President Donald Trump to hike tariffs and is considering how to respond should his new administration raise trade barriers, the government said on Tuesday.

Trump aims to kick the aggressive trade agenda from his first term into higher gear with across-the-board 10% tariffs on imported goods and even higher levies on imports from China.

The move could hurt the export-orientated Swiss economy, which has the United States as it biggest market, experts say.

“Switzerland is concerned about Donald Trump’s announcement to impose additional tariffs on all goods imported in to the U.S.” a spokesman for the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) said.

“Switzerland clearly rejects the (Trump administration’s) plans,” the spokesman added.

The proposals contravene the rules-based international trading system which was crucial to the Swiss economy, the spokesman added.

Currently around a fifth of Swiss goods exports go to the United States, according to customs data, making the country a more important market than Germany, China or France.

SECO said Bern was examining “sensible responses” in the interests of the Swiss economy and seeking discussions with the relevant U.S. authorities, as well as counterparts in Germany, France, and Italy and the European Union on how to respond.

SECO did not give details on what responses were being considered, although Switzerland’s leeway could be restricted after it scrapped all industrial tariffs this year.

Currently the U.S. has low single-digit tariffs on the import of industrial goods, with many Swiss industrial exports to the U.S. duty-free.