US unilateral tariffs disrupt normal trade and economic cooperation: China's commerce minister to US counterpart

The US' unilateral tariff measures undermine normal economic and trade cooperation between the two countries. Hopefully the two sides can address mutual concerns through equal dialogue and consultation, China's Commerce Minister Wang Wentao said in a letter sent to the newly appointed US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Wednesday.

Wang congratulated Lutnick on assuming the position as the 41st US Secretary of Commerce. In the letter, Wang also raised concerns over the US decision to impose additional tariffs on Chinese imports, according to a statement released by the Ministry of Commerce.

Economic and trade relations are an important component of China-US relations. As the two largest economies in the world, strengthening the bilateral economic and trade cooperation is of significant importance to the development of both countries and to global economic growth, Wang said. 

As the latest in a series of measures threatening to upend international trade, US President Donald Trump claimed on Tuesday he intends to impose auto tariffs "in the neighborhood of 25 percent" and similar duties on semiconductors and pharmaceutical imports, Reuters reported.

While Washington threatened to impose additional tariffs, over 30 WTO members expressed serious concern over the US' approach at the first 2025 meeting of the WTO's General Council on Tuesday, Xinhua News Agency reported.

The EU Mission to the WTO said one of its key issues at the meeting was "defending the rules-based trading system, under strain - and increasingly under attack," according to the mission's post on X.

Canada, New Zealand, and Singapore urged the international community to avoid a return to an era of power politics and to a "law of the jungle," according to Xinhua.

Norway and Nicaragua warned that the trade war and its resulting uncertainty will severely impact small and medium-sized nations that depend on international trade. Brazil, Pakistan, and others called for the protection of the post-World War II international economic system and the principle of most-favored-nation treatment. Australia, Nigeria, Egypt, and others also urged restraint in implementing unilateral measures that undermine the multilateral trading system. 

China's Ambassador to the WTO Li Chenggang also voiced strong concern at the meeting over the US' unilateral imposition of tariffs and their harmful effects.

At the meeting, Li called on the US to remove these measures and urged all parties to take meaningful action to uphold the rules-based multilateral trading system, which resonated deeply with the audience. 

He said US' unilateral and arbitrary tariffs, affecting China and other trading partners, have caused global "tariff shocks."

Li highlighted that such actions blatantly violate WTO rules, heighten economic uncertainty, and disrupt global trade. 

Defending multilateralism

The US' approach not only impacts global trade but also has ripple effects on the world economy. If such actions are allowed, it poses a serious challenge to the multilateral trading system, He Weiwen, a senior fellow from the Center for China and Globalization, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

Diao Daming, a professor at the Renmin University of China in Beijing, told the Global Times on Wednesday that the US tariffs will not only negatively impact its trading partners, but also increase costs for US consumers.

New tariffs will mean higher prices for American families. And it can lead to increased challenges for US retailers because of added warehousing and related costs, according to a press release that the US National Retail Federation (NRF) shared with the Global Times on Wednesday, citing NRF Vice President for Supply Chain and Customs Policy Jonathan Gold.

The planned auto tariffs are clearly a pure manifestation of trade protectionism. Its goal is to safeguard the US automotive industry, and the policy caters to blue-collar white voters in the Midwest, a key part of Trump's electoral base, Diao said.

However, the US automotive industry doesn't seem to share the same enthusiasm. According to a Guardian report, Ford CEO Jim Farley told an investor conference in New York last week that a 25 percent tariff on Mexico and Canada "will blow a hole in the US industry that we have never seen."

Excessive protection will instead undermine the competitiveness of US industries, He Weiwen said.

Other global automakers are also being forced to ramp up response efforts.

Germany-based Volkswagen Group told the Global Times in an email on Wednesday that they're "monitoring developments in North America very closely."

"We continue to promote open markets and stable trade relations. These are essential for a competitive economy and for the automotive industry in particular," the auto giant said.

Not only governments, global markets and businesses are increasingly worried. The frequent introduction of tariff policies by the Trump administration is further eroding predictability in international trade, which is highly detrimental to the global economy, Zhou Mi, a senior research fellow at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

Japanese, South Korean, and German manufacturers will bear the brunt of the potential US auto tariffs, while semiconductor tariffs will impact both the island of Taiwan and Chinese mainland, Zhou said.

Japan and South Korea are also the potential victims of the semiconductor tariffs, Reuters said in a separate report.

In fact, related US domestic industries, which depends heavily on imports, will experience direct and significant supply chain disruptions. This will drive up costs and put additional inflationary pressure on the US economy, Zhou said.

Also, commenting on the "reciprocal" tariffs policy Trump recently announced, Gary Clyde Hufbauer, a nonresident senior fellow at the US-based Peterson Institute for International Economics, told the Global Times that "Trump's definition of reciprocity would mean the end of bilateral trade imbalances and a crazy patchwork of trade barriers. As a consequence, global trade would shrink, and the world would experience a global depression."

"My expectation is that countries other than the US will follow customary rules, reached in the WTO and free trade agreements, for trade between themselves, while retaliating against new US tariffs imposed by Trump," Hufbauer said.

China has filed a complaint with the WTO's dispute settlement mechanism against the US decision to impose an additional 10-percent tariff on goods from China, the Ministry of Commerce said on February 4.

China always believes that protectionism will lead nowhere, and there is no winner in a trade war or a tariff war It is a universal consensus of the international community, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Guo Jiakun said at a press briefing on Tuesday.