US President Donald Trump yesterday hailed his administration’s temporary truce with China on trade, even as his Treasury secretary and China struck a note of caution on the latest agreement.
He said China had pledged to buy “massive amounts” of US agricultural products, but gave no other details about planned commitments from Beijing following US-China trade talks last week.
“Fair Trade, plus, with China will happen!” Trump wrote in a series of posts on Twitter that came a day after US Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin said a trade war between the world’s largest economies was “on hold.”
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“China has agreed to buy massive amounts of ADDITIONAL Farm/Agricultural Products - would be one of the best things to happen to our farmers in many years!” Trump wrote.
“On China, Barriers and Tariffs to come down for first time,” he added.
He offered no specifics about what steps US and Chinese officials had agreed to after talks on Thursday and Friday in Washington.
Over the weekend, Beijing and Washington pledged to keep talking about how China could import more energy and agricultural commodities from the US to narrow the US$335 billion annual US goods and services trade deficit with China.
Mnuchin yesterday said that US Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross would travel to Beijing next week to help finalize a trade pact.
“Secretary Ross has to go over and turn that into a signed piece of paper with companies,” Mnuchin told reporters at the White House.
“This is not a government-to-government purchase order, but we have an agreement with them as to what will be executed,” he said.
He said the lowering of trade tariffs had been discussed and meaningful progress had been made.
However, if the US does not get what it wants to bring down the massive trade deficit with Beijing, Trump can put the tariffs back on, Mnuchin said, adding that structural changes to US trade with China would be part of the framework.
The trade talks would have to be turned into binding agreements with companies, he said.
Trump had not dictated any terms about the US’ review of China’s ZTE Corp (中興通訊), he said.
Earlier in the day, China had said it could not guarantee that renewed trade tension with Washington could be avoided.
Mnuchin’s comments on Sunday that the two sides were “putting the trade war on hold” showed both sides hope to avoid a “trade war,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Lu Kang (陸慷) said.
However, “given the increasing interaction between the two countries, we cannot assure you they will not encounter more frictions or disputes in the future,” Lu said.
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