DUTIES, IMPACT ON SOUTH-EAST ASIA: “EU, ITALY AND ASEAN WILL STRENGTHEN COOPERATION"

Southeast Asian countries are among those most affected by the duties imposed by the United States on what Donald Trump has dubbed ’Liberation Day.” All 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have been affected. To be precise, as of April 9, additional import taxes will be imposed with the following percentages: 49 percent for Cambodia, 48 percent for Laos, 46 percent for Vietnam, 44 percent for Myanmar, 36 percent for Thailand, 32 percent for Indonesia, 24 percent for Malaysia and Brunei, 17 percent for the Philippines, and 10 percent for Singapore. Many of these countries are strong exporters to the United States, while the region has long been among the leading factors of global trade, having signed a number of bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements. “Now these countries in Southeast Asia will have to look more carefully at other markets than the U.S., the same need that many other countries including European ones will have,” stresses Ambassador Michelangelo Pipan, President of the Italy-ASEAN Association. “Consequently, the European Union and Italy itself, which enjoy several free trade agreements with some of these countries, can and must equip themselves to strengthen trade relations with Southeast Asia,” Pipan continues,stressing that ”our interests and those of ASEAN atguarding free trade and against protectionism coincide. Even more so after the new White House tariffs.

“Washington has decided to hit Southeast Asian countries despite the concessions already made in recent days by some of them. This is the case of Vietnam, which in recent years has risen to a critically important global trade and technology hub, which has announced duty reductions and a commitment to import more U.S. goods. “It is still early to make predictions, but this disruption caused by Trump seems destined to foster the creation of different constellations that by increasing cooperation with each other will try to make up for this closure of the U.S. market,” Ambassador Pipan explains. Dataon trade between Italy and ASEAN have increased enormously over the past year, thanks in part to the work done by the Italy-ASEAN Association.