By Emily Green and David Lawder
MEXICO CITY, April 22 (Reuters) - Mexico's Economy Minister Marcelo Ebrard acknowledged on Wednesday that tariffs on the country's automotive, steel and aluminum sectors are likely to remain in place, regardless of whether a trade deal with the U.S. and Canada is renewed.
"We shouldn’t be nostalgic about a time when there were no tariffs," Ebrard told reporters on the sidelines of an event on Wednesday. "When it comes to the automotive industry, steel and aluminum—which
have been our priority—we know it is very difficult to think that tariffs will disappear. What we are looking for is how to reduce them."
His comments come one day after Reuters reported that U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told Mexico's auto and steel industries earlier this week they should not expect the renegotiation of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement to remove President Donald Trump's tariffs on their sectors.
Ebrard, who is leading Mexico's negotiations with the U.S. to revamp USMCA starting the week of May 25, said Greer shared the same message with Mexican business leaders and largely repeated it to U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday.
"The world—the global trading system we had, based on free trade—is very unlikely to return," Ebrard said.
COMMITTED TO TARIFFS
Greer told the U.S. House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee that Trump intended to keep tariffs in place on U.S. imports, that his trade policies have not changed.
"He's not going to go back to the old situation where we had no tariffs and we just let foreign goods made by foreign workers come in without any fee to the detriment of domestic workers," Greer said. "The president will have tariffs using appropriate legal tools."
Mexico and Canada have been looking to the USMCA negotiations as a way to provide relief from the steep duties Trump imposed last year that have caused difficulties for automakers and other industries in a highly integrated North American economy.
Trump last year imposed a 25% national security tariff on automotive exports from Mexico and Canada, compared to zero under USMCA, which Trump launched in 2020 as the "greatest trade deal ever."
Although the value of U.S. content can be deducted from the import value of vehicles and parts, automakers say that Trump's 25% duties put Mexico and Canada at a disadvantage to other major auto-producing countries and regions. Vehicles from Japan, South Korea and the European Union are charged a 15% tariff, while cars from Britain are charged 10%.
Mexico's steel industry faces a 50% U.S. duty on commodity steel and aluminum products and a 25% duty for derivative goods containing at least 15% of the metals by weight.
(Reporting by Emily Green and David Lawder; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)
