In January 2025, the average effective US tariff against Brazilian products was 1.19%. At the end of this month, under Trump, they will reach 14.42%. Reuters via BBC After the announcement of new 25% tariffs against Brazilian products made by the United States government on Wednesday (15), Brazil will become the country that has seen the most increase in American tariffs since Donald Trump's return to the White House, compared to the 30 countries that export the most to the USA. When Joe Biden ended his term in January 2025, the average effective US tariff against Brazilian products was 1.19%. Currently the average effective tariff is 11.66%. At the end of this month, when the Trump administration's measures come into force, the tariff against Brazil will have risen to 14.42% — a jump of more than 13 percentage points. ?? Do you have any reporting suggestions? Send to g1 No other country has seen such a huge jump in tariffs since Trump returned to power — although several countries have also seen an increase in their rates. Effective import tariffs rose 9.57 percentage points for products from South Korea, 8.39 for Thailand, 7.7 for Japan and 7.48 points for China. The data updated this Thursday (16/07) is from an initiative called Global Trade Alert (GTA), in which global trade figures are compiled by the St. Gallen Endowment, an independent think tank based in Switzerland. This data already includes the new announcement made by the White House. After investigation, USA confirms 25% tariff on Brazilian products. GTA data compiled exclusively at the request of BBC News Brasil only consider effective tariffs (i.e., those actually charged on products) and not nominal tariffs (which are those explicit in legislation and announced by the government). There is a difference between the two rates, as the USA lists several exceptions for Brazilian products that do not need to pay the same rates (check the report below). The nominal rate announced by the White House is 25%, but in practice — considering the more than 2,000 products that are either exempt from these tariffs or receive a lower rate — the average effective rate is 14.42%, according to the GTA's calculation. Brazilian products are only taxed lower than Chinese products — the average effective tariff for imports from China in the USA will reach 21.5% at the end of this month. Before the announcement, Brazil was the 13th country with the highest average effective tariff in the USA. Trump's new tariffs made Brazil surpass 11 countries in the ranking of the most tariffed in the world: Turkey, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Japan, South Korea, Germany, India, Austria, Sweden and Italy. Exceptions Brazil was the target of a major commercial investigation that began in July last year — in which it accuses the Brazilian government of a series of unfair commercial practices. In June, the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), which conducted the investigation, had suggested in a 107-page document several retaliatory measures against Brazil, with tariffs of 25% on Brazilian products. This Wednesday, the American government announced its final decision, which is slightly milder than the suggestion given by the USTR last month. The USTR's original proposal would have raised the average effective tariffs against Brazilian products to 14.89%, according to GTA calculations. Now the Swiss entity calculates that the average tariff will be 14.42%. American tariffs apply to thousands of imported products such as sugar, agricultural machinery, clothing, electrical machines, paper and steel — but there is also a vast list of exceptions that were disclosed in an annex in June. In this week's new decision, the US included other products such as organic honey, pig iron and unflavored instant coffee on the list of exemptions. The US consulted in public hearings open to all sectors of the economy. The document released by the American government this week states that during consultations, authorities received comments from US industrial sectors, claiming that some Brazilian products should be included in the tariff exception list. Among the reasons given are the fact that some of these products are difficult to replace, present a risk of causing disruptions in the supply chain or would contribute little to the objectives of the US investigation. Only a quarter of Brazilian products will pay the maximum tariff of 25%, according to the GTA. This means that of the US$39.6 billion exported by Brazil to the USA — using 2024 values ??— around US$8.5 billion would be subject to the maximum rate. READ ALSO: See which of the 50 Brazilian products most exported to the USA will pay the new 25% tariff 'An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth?' What the Reciprocity Law says that Lula wants to use against new US tariffs Impact For Rodrigo Zeidan, professor at New York University Shanghai, in China, and Fundação Dom Cabral, even with the large number of exceptions on the list, some Brazilian producers may suffer from the new tariff. "The list is long. It won't be 25% at all. Much of what we export to them is on the exception list, so the impact will be smaller," Zeidan told BBC News Brasil. "But [the tariff] does affect a lot of people, because they denied authorization for specific industrialized manufactured products. And these products are much more difficult for you to find other buyers in the world." He says that for industries that work with homogeneous products — such as commodities — there is less impact on pricing, as sales can be redirected to other countries without changes in production. "But it's more complicated when you produce machines and parts and equipment that are specific to an industry. The more specialized it is, the more problematic [pricing] is for a company." "The tariff, in general, ended up being much lower than 25%. But for several companies the impact will be quite large." Brazil's reaction In a statement, the Brazilian government repudiated the announced decision, saying that July 15th "will go down in the history of relations between Brazil and the USA as a regrettable milestone". Also according to the note, Brazil will begin the procedures to activate the Reciprocity Law approved by the National Congress and will take the case to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Rubio accuses Lula of not negotiating tariffs: 'He put his own ego ahead of an agreement' On Tuesday (14) before the official announcement of the tariffs, the Minister of Finance, Dario Durigan, stated that the Brazilian government could adopt reciprocity if the United States confirmed a new tariff against Brazil. "We ended up suspending the reciprocity process, following the law of the National Congress, when there was a kind of reversal in the tariff. With this now, I think it is likely that we, once President Lula has been consulted, will resume the reciprocity process. All of this within a scenario of cautious evaluation", he told journalists. Lula government promises to react with a new reciprocity law. EPA via BBC The announcement of the tariffs was already expected by diplomats interviewed privately by BBC News Brasil and by the Minister of Development, Industry, Commerce and Services (MDIC), Márcio Elias Rosa. In an interview given two weeks ago to BBC News Brasil, the minister stated that the Brazilian government was still trying to negotiate a last-minute agreement with Washington, but already admitted the possibility of an unfavorable outcome for the country. Professor Rodrigo Zeidan believes that Brazil has the capacity to adopt reciprocity measures — but that this could generate new American retaliation. In this case, it is difficult to predict what would happen. "The United States has said that negotiations are continuing. Negotiations are possible. But American attention sometimes changes very quickly." End of another tariff Johannes Fritz — director of the St. Gallen Endowment who compiled the GTA data — highlighted that American tariffs against Brazilian products are coming into force a few days before the end of another 10% American tariff against several countries around the world, including Brazil. In February, Trump signed a proclamation based on Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act, which allowed him to impose a new temporary 10% tariff on goods from all countries. But in May this tariff was overturned by a court. However, they remain in force while an appeal is being processed and should only expire on July 26th. In a brief period of four days — between July 22nd and 26th — the effective rate against products from Brazil will be 18.17%, according to GTA calculations. What is the investigation against Brazil? In July last year, the US government opened a trade investigation against Brazil based on the so-called Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act, a legal instrument that allows Washington to investigate foreign practices considered unfair or discriminatory against American companies and products. The procedure, conducted by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), resulted in retaliatory measures, such as the imposition of additional tariffs on Brazilian exports, announced this Wednesday. The American government concluded, in a report released last month, that certain practices by the Brazilian government are "unreasonable" and "encumber or restrict US trade." One of the targets of the American document is the Pix payment system. "Brazil has unfairly harmed American companies that operate in competing electronic payment services, including through policies that favor its national champion, Pix", states the document. The American government accuses the Brazilian Central Bank of playing a dual role in Pix — "as regulator and owner/operator" — creating a "conflict of interests, in the absence of adequate procedural safeguards". The 107-page USTR document released in June brought conclusions from the investigation in six different areas: Digital commerce and electronic payment services: according to the American government, "Brazilian courts issued confidential decisions ordering American social media companies to remove certain political content and suspend profiles of residents in the United States — in some cases, with global reach —, in addition to prohibiting the platforms from informing users about these orders." The document talks about the imposition of high fines, restrictions on access to assets, accounts and payment systems in Brazil and, in at least one case, the total blocking of a website. Preferential tariffs considered unfair: "through preferential trade agreements of limited scope with Mexico and India — which cover sectors in which these countries are advanced and globally competitive producers — Brazil grants lower tariffs and preferential treatment to hundreds of Mexican and Indian products in several sectors." Fighting corruption: "Brazil does not adopt sufficient inspection measures to combat bribery and corruption practices." Protection of intellectual property: "Brazil does not adequately reinforce the application of its criminal laws and customs regulations to combat counterfeit products"; "does not solve the excessive delay in analyzing patent applications, especially in the biopharmaceutical sector"; and "does not maintain consistent and continuous actions against piracy". Access to the ethanol market: in 2017, "Brazil abruptly interrupted the previously balanced tariff treatment for ethanol and, since then, has not offered reciprocity to American exports." Illegal deforestation: despite having a legal framework to combat illegal deforestation, "Brazil has historically been unable to apply it effectively, and the practice persists." Analysts say the Trump administration has been using Section 301 investigations as an alternative to another tariff proposal that was struck down by the country's Supreme Court. In February, the court ruled that Trump overstepped his authority by using a different law — the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) of 1977 — to impose sweeping tariffs on US trading partners, including Brazil. The legislation used now — Section 301 of the Commerce Act of 1974 — would withstand legal challenges, experts say.