Deandrea Hamilton

Editor

USA, April 4, 2025 – Unless a deal is struck, the expectation is that every country will now pay tariffs to the United States as part of the Donald Trump Administration’s move toward regularizing trade deficits and restoring American manufacturing.

“With today’s action, we are finally going to be able to make America great again, greater than ever before. Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country, and you see it happening already. We will supercharge our domestic industrial base. We will pry open foreign markets and break down foreign trade barriers.  And ultimately, more production at home will mean stronger competition and lower prices for consumers. This will be indeed the golden age of America,” said President Trump in an elaborate ceremony held in the Rose Garden of the White House on Tuesday.

For small island developing States like the ones which occupy the Caribbean, the tariff hit was 10% for all but two countries.  Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago attracted higher “reciprocal” tariffs; T&T at 12% and Guyana at 38%.

By midnight Wednesday April 3, dubbed ‘Liberation Day’ by President Donald Trump, there was a measured response from many of the small island developing states, including Guyana which currently enjoys US military support in a stare down with Venezuela and which charges a 76% tariff on US goods into its country.

“The Government of Guyana has taken note of the reciprocal tariffs announced by the US Government earlier today. Our Government is closely engaged with our US partners to better understand the issue and have it addressed as appropriate.”

Guyana exports gold, crude oil, fish, shrimp, timber, rums and agricultural products to the US.

The Bahamas, through its Minister of Economic Affairs explained the plan is to wait and see, for now.

“It is important to note that The Bahamas currently maintains a trade deficit with the United States.  We will engage with out US counterparts and work collectively with our CARICOM partners in response to this development.”

The Bahamas is also looking to diversify its source markets.

“As part of our broader strategy to protect the Bahamian economy, we have already announced a number of measures, including the development of a trade diversification framework.”

The Turks and Caicos Islands Government is aware of the announcement, according to Jamell Robinson, TCI Deputy Premier and Border Services Minister.  So far, however, there has been no official statement issued.

The countries from the region are among the 180 worldwide, absorbing the shift and working through how it will impact local economies. At home, in the US, the Trump Administration has seen a dramatic reaction by the Markets in these very early days.

The Stock Market plunged on Liberation Day; the losses so steep, economists compared it to the reaction of the Market in 2020 at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

A seemingly unperturbed President Trump said the reeling on Wall Street and other markets was no surprise to him.  Trump and his Vice President were instead in lockstep in their messaging.

“For forty years we’ve had an economy that rewards people who ship American jobs overseas and raises taxes on American workers and we’re flipping that on its head,” said J.D. Vance, US Vice President on Friday.

Donald Trump has reported his strategy has brought home trillions in new investments.

“I think it’s going very well.  It was an operation, like when a patient gets operated on, and it’s a big thing.  I said this would exactly be the way it is; we have six or seven trillion dollars coming into our country, and we’ve never seen anything like it.  The markets are gonna boom, the stock is gonna boom, the country is gonna boom and the rest of the world wants to see if there is any way they can make a deal,” explained Trump when asked about the market response to Liberation Day.

So far, world market leaders are reacting in a variety of ways, according to The Guardian.

Keir Starmer, British Prime Minister has expressed relief at the 10% tariff that country has been hit with; it had anticipated double that said the news.

India was none too ruffled; saying it was buffered for the tariff threshold Trump sent their way and pleased there would be no tariff on pharmaceuticals.

Australia is also happy, its prime minister boasting that, ‘no one got a better deal.’

New Zealand will be seeking to talk to the United States after being hit with a 10% tariff, calculated as half the 20% levied on US goods into that country.  Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said, “We don’t understand how that figure has been calculated,” he said.

However, Taiwan is calling the tariff of 32% “harsh” and in that Guardian report, Bloomberg forecasts a dramatic constriction of Taiwan’s GDP.

Here are the Caribbean countries listed on the information shared by the White House, the tariffs they will pay and the tariffs they charge the US.

Dominican Republic: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Trinidad and Tobago: 10% (charges U.S. 12%); Bahamas: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Guyana: 38% (charges U.S. 76%); Haiti: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Jamaica: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Sint Maarten: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Belize: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); British Virgin Islands: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Barbados: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Cayman Islands: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Curaçao: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Antigua and Barbuda: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Bermuda: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Saint Kitts and Nevis: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Grenada:10% (charges U.S. 10%); Turks and Caicos Islands: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Aruba: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Saint Vincent and the Grenadines: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Saint Lucia: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Montserrat: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Guadeloupe: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Martinique: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Dominica: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Anguilla: 10% (charges U.S. 10%); Suriname: 10% (charges U.S. 10%).

CARICOM is expected to speak in solidarity as it considers its response to the United States move, which has undoubtedly launched a global economic reset.