Japan Safeguard Tariff on US Beef To Have Immediate Impact
According to industry experts, Japan’s just-announced ‘safeguard’ tariff on frozen U.S. beef could have been prevented with TPP. The U.S. beef industry says had TPP been in effect, or had the U.S. had a bilateral trade deal with Japan, like Australia, Tokyo’s automatic 50% safeguard tariff from August 1st through next March 31st 2018, could have been avoided. First quarter U.S. sales triggered the tariff.
“The safeguards that they have in TPP was on a yearly basis and it was much more liberal, so I have the feeling that because we just exceeded the amount by only 113 metric tons, it was very, very close under this the old administration," said U.S. Meat Export Federation Chief Phil Seng. "But under TPP this would not have been the case.”
Seng said Japan’s WTO-permitted 11.5% tariff hike could have a big impact on frozen beef sales in the U.S.’s largest beef market, worth $1.5 billion. On top of that, Australian frozen beef suddenly has a nearly 23% tariff advantage over U.S. beef, while Mexico won a similar deal.
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