The second package that was voted through on Thursday includes countermeasures of 72 billion euros, plus certain export restrictions. Together with the previous package, this means countermeasures of a total of 93 billion euros – equivalent to over 1,000 billion kronor.
There are additional tools in the toolbox that we can use, if we do not feel that the USA is on its way to a solution with us, says Benjamin Dousa at a press conference.
The European Commission, which has drawn up the proposal, is expected to make the formal decision during Thursday, according to the Minister for Foreign Trade's staff.
Apply pressure
The tactic from the EU's side is to apply further pressure on the American administration by presenting new countermeasures, while keeping all doors open for negotiations.
We hope that we can reach an agreement as soon as possible. Hopefully within the next few days and weeks, says Dousa.
It seems difficult to reach a "pre-Trump level" on tariffs. Instead, it is a new world and a new USA that we are living with.
The EU's countermeasure package is paused until the beginning of August, precisely to create space for negotiations to be completed. Financial Times reports, citing sources, that an agreement where goods from the EU, with certain exceptions, are subject to 15 percent tariffs in the USA is near.
Olof Gill, policy spokesperson for the European Commission on trade issues, tells TT that the EU and the USA are now very close to an agreement.
We have made it clear to the Americans what we can and cannot agree to now. Now it is their responsibility to explain to us if they are willing to make a deal or not. If they are willing to meet us halfway, we can get an agreement within the next week, maybe earlier.
Daily contacts
Since negotiations are still ongoing, Gill cannot confirm that the tariff level that the EU is willing to accept is 15 percent. But since the USA has already introduced additional tariffs of 10 percent, 15 percent is not that much higher, he emphasizes.
Given this, our member states are making the best of a very bad situation.
It is thanks to a strong commitment from the EU's Trade Commissioner, who has continuously traveled to the USA since February, and the almost daily contacts with American partners at a high level that one has come so far in the negotiations, says Olof Gill.
Now it depends on the last details and on the USA meeting us halfway.
Since the tariff shock in early April – when the tariff levels were significantly higher – the USA's President Donald Trump has introduced a general punitive tariff on all imported goods of 10 percent, mainly motivated by the USA's large deficit in trade with the rest of the world.
This level applies to most countries – including the EU – until Trump's deadline expires at the turn of the month.
Trump has also introduced sectoral tariffs on cars and car parts of 25 percent and steel and aluminum of 50 percent – spiced with threats of future tariffs on everything from medicines to semiconductors.
In an agreement with Japan on Tuesday, the Trump administration's tariffs on Japanese goods ended up at 15 percent – after threats that they would be 25 percent.
