“And we may do it as early as today, or we’ll wait till Monday or Tuesday,” Trump said.
President Donald Trump says he will place reciprocal tariffs on Canadian lumber and dairy products as early as March 7, to match the duties Canada charges for shipping the products to the United States.
“Canada has been ripping us off for years on tariffs for lumber and for dairy products,” Trump said from the Oval Office on March 7.
“They’ll be met with the exact same tariff unless they drop it, and that’s what reciprocal means,” he added.
“And we may do it as early as today, or we’ll wait till Monday or Tuesday.”
Trump said Canada had been treating American farmers “very unfairly” by imposing high tariffs on dairy products of up to 250 percent, and that Canadian trade representatives had been “very difficult to deal with.”
Canada has a supply management system that coordinates production and demand relating to dairy, chicken, eggs, and turkey products while controlling imports as a way of setting stable prices for farmers and consumers.
The U.S. president also said his administration is changing environmental standards to allow for more lumber production so the country does not “need” Canadian lumber. The U.S. Lumber Association has accused Canada of benefitting from unfair trade practices, which it said is leading to the closures of U.S. lumber mills.
“They make it impossible for us to sell lumber or dairy products into Canada. But our numbers are a tiny fraction of that, almost nonexistent,” Trump said.
Trump had initially vowed to impose reciprocal tariffs on countries on April 2, and has vowed to put 25 percent tariffs on all imports of steel and aluminum on March 12.
The Liberal government said on Feb. 6 that it would not make concessions concerning the country’s supply management system, with International Trade Minister Mary Ng saying the system is “really important to the Canadian economy.” She added that the issue had been negotiated as part of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) during Trump’s first term as president. During the negotiations of the agreement in Trump’s first presidency, Canada made some concessions to its supply management, allowing the United States more access to the Canadian market.
