A tariff war between the EU and the US is threatening to buckle one of Greece’s most buoyant export sectors, which survived a decade of economic crises, but possibly not US President Donald Trump.
The Trump administration’s decision to impose an additional 25 percent tariff on a range of EU products in retaliation for EU aircraft subsidies, hits products from Scotch to Italian cheeses and French wines.
In Greece, its prized canned peach.
Photo: Reuters
Greece is the world’s biggest exporter of tinned peaches with about one-fifth of its 250,000 tonnes annual production absorbed by the US market.
Formerly subject to an import levy of 18 percent, the new tariffs — part of WTO-authorized countermeasures to Airbus subsidies — would increase the total import duty to the US to 43 percent.
The people of northern Greece are not impressed.
“Trump would do well to behave himself and let us get to work so we can have a livelihood,” peach farmer Tasos Halkidis said. “We don’t want this tariff business.”
The fertile plain straddling the regions of Imathia and Pella in central Macedonia is one massive peach orchard. A sea of pink greets visitors in the spring, when the peaches are in bloom.
Standing in a huge warehouse piled high with millions of aluminum cans, 63-year-old Kostas Apostolou, head of the Greek Canners Association, said the dispute is threatening their livelihood and would potentially shut them out of their biggest market.
“Why are they punishing us?” Apostolou said.
The increase in tariffs came into effect on Oct. 18, just as Greeks readied to ship 50 million tins to US markets.
Many customers there — mainly catering companies that supply hospitals, schools and the military — have either canceled orders or have said they would not be prepared to pay for any tariff increase, producers said.
“Suddenly there was this [trade] war... We could never imagine that this could affect our jobs here in this small area,” Apostolou said.
Stuck with excess supply, producers are also uncomfortably aware how their production lines are tailored to the US market. The sector is saddled with 3kg tins aimed at the US, which cannot be sold in Europe, Asia or Latin America where 1kg tins are dispatched.
The Canners Association and other industry experts estimated the loss of income from the US market at about US$50 million — a small amount in terms of international trade, but vital for one of the poorer regions in Greece, with unemployment at 20 percent.
They are worried that resulting excess product would lead to a collapse in prices and unemployment would jump.
The heart of Greek peach country is planted with millions of trees in an area of more than 20,000 hectares.
About 10,000 small farms and 10,000 employees work for 17 can factories in the area, with the peach crop giving life to the wider Imathia and Pella regions.
“It’s a shock,” said Eleftherios Saitis, who built one of the first can factories in the early 1970s.
The sector is already reeling from the impact of a Russian embargo on the EU fruit and vegetable sector imposed in 2014. Farmers worry this might be the final blow.
“Now with the tariffs from the United States, it will be a very big hit, it will be a catastrophe,” Halkidis said.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS