WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump announced a trade deal with Vietnam Wednesday that would allow US goods to enter the country duty-free. Vietnamese exports to the United States, by contrast, would face a 20% levy. On his Truth Social platform, Trump declared the pact “a Great Deal of Cooperation between our two Countries”.In a govt statement, Vietnam confirmed that negotiating teams had come to an agreement to address the reciprocal tariff issue, but did not detail any tariff terms. Trump “affirmed that the US will significantly reduce reciprocal taxes for many Vietnamese export goods and will continue to cooperate with Vietnam in resolving difficulties affecting bilateral trade relations, especially in areas prioritized by both sides,” the statement said.In April, Trump announced a 46% tax on Vietnamese imports – one of his so-called reciprocal tariffs targeting dozens of countries with which the United States runs trade deficits.Trump promptly suspended the reciprocal tariffs for 90 days to allow for negotiations like the one with Vietnam. The pause expires Tuesday, but so far the Trump administration has reached a trade agreement with only one of those countries – the United Kingdom. (Trump has also reached a “framework” agreement with China in a separate trade dispute.)The United States last year ran a $122 billion trade deficit with Vietnam. That was the third-biggest US trade gap – the difference between the goods and services it buys from other countries and those it sells them – behind the ones with China and Mexico.In addition to the 20% tariffs, Trump said the US would impose a 40% tax on “transshipping” – goods from another country that stop in Vietnam on their way to the United States. Washington complains that Chinese goods have been dodging higher US tariffs by transiting through Vietnam. In May, Vietnam approved a $1.5 billion project by the Trump Organisation and a local partner to build a massive golf resort complex near its capital Hanoi, covering an area roughly the size of 336 football fields.
