The European Union says it will impose tariffs on up to four billion dollars worth of U.S. goods and services including some agricultural imports. What specifically those are is unclear. Iowa Soybean Association President Jeff Jorgenson says that makes things difficult as the U.S. has been working to get a trade agreement with the Europeans. He says issues outside agriculture prompted this action because of a dispute over aid given to Boeing a competitor of Europe’s Airbus.
He says the E.U..has been difficult to deal with on trade issues as they’ve put up non-tariff trade barriers and have continued to oppose the use of biotech crops.
Jorgenson as far as future trade policy goes, with the change in leaders in both houses of Congress along with a new President coming in, there’s a lot of uncertainty to get through.
The E.U.s tariff move was partially prompted by last year’s WTO ruling that allowed the U.S. to impose duties on E.U. good worth $7.5 billion because of their support for Airbus.
