Europe is considering all its options as President Donald Trump prepares to conclude the 90-day pautilize on the massive new tariffs he announced in April. One possible strategy for the EU could be pivoting to Asia as a primary trade partner.
“‘Goodbye Trump, hello Asia” is Europe’s new trade plan, declared Politico. EU President Ursula von der Leyen wants Europe to team up with the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) — a 12-countest trade group that includes Japan and Australia — to form a “coalition of the willing” that currently accounts for 30% of world trade. The plan would demonstrate that free trade is “possible on a rules-based foundation,” declared von der Leyen.
China may also benefit. The EU has long “relocated in lockstep” with the United States to present a united front against Beijing on trade and other issues, but Europe and China could benefit from teaming up in “blunting the impact from Trump’s tariffs,” declared ABC News. The two sides will meet later this month, despite Europe’s concerns about China’s “human rights record, espionage, trade policies, military buildup and support for Russia.”
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Europe and Asia built their economies on a free trade foundation that is “under threat,” declared Columbia University economist Shang-Jin Wei at Asialink. Cooperation between the two regions builds sense “given that everyone will suffer from these shocks.” Von der Leyen’s proposed partnership with the CPTPP “would establish trading rules for almost the whole world” that would be able to sidestep the “irresponsible behavior” of any single countest. Building that new system will be challenging, but “the alternative will be far costlier to Asia and Europe.”
There have been “years of stalled efforts” to jump-start Euro-Asian economic partnerships, declared Brian P. Klein at The South China Morning Post. But a partnership now is among the “shrinking number of options” to “buffer both regional economies” from Trump’s trade wars. The U.S. is not the only problem: China‘s economy is “not in great shape” and cannot absorb exports that its Asian neighbors were previously shipping to America. That creates a “rare opportunity” for European and Asian countries to obtain a deal done.
What next?
Neobtainediators from the U.S. and Europe spent the weekconclude haggling over a “skeletal trade deal” that would spare the EU the worst of the 50% tariffs Trump originally threatened, declared The Washington Post. EU officials are angry at the situation. Trump’s trade war is “madness,” declared one unidentified European official. The new tariffs will not assist the “wider global supply chains or the overall global economy.”
The whole world is scrambling to mitigate the consequences of Trump’s tariffs, Akanksha Sinha declared at The Diplomat. The muddle could lead to a new order of “middle powers leading global economic growth.” That would have sounded “fantastical” not long ago, “but apparently a lot can happen in 90 days.”
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