Are there signs of a trade war on the horizon between Washington and Beijing?

Written by / Mohamed Baghdadi

PhD researcher

Mh_boghdady@yahoo.com

     Is there a trade war between Washington and Beijing? What are the implications for global markets? And to what extent can this war be fought between the giants of the global economy? How do we evaluate the current economic situation between the two countries?

    The trade war between China and the United States began after Donald Trump announced in the beginning of 2018 his desire to impose fees on Chinese goods entering the country, where it exceeded 50 billion dollars to protect its markets from Chinese goods. For its part, the Chinese government imposed customs duties on more than 128 American goods in response to The American decision to impose fees on its goods. Washington has also activated its previous decision to impose fees estimated at 34 billion dollars on Chinese goods, and thus the two countries became in the midst of an economic trade war to preserve the internal markets of both countries. This leads us to another question: Will this war end what has been called the open economy? Is each country retaining its decision to impose customs duties a return?

     Washington also made it clear that the direct reason for making this decision is the unfair trade practices that it had come from from Beijing for several years, “including theft of intellectual property. In a related context, we find that the Chinese Ministry of Commerce imposed customs duties on several American commodities, including: beans Soy, aluminum, cars, planes, pork, steel, fruits, and Washington, on the one hand, imposed tariffs for more than 1,300 items including: batteries, medical devices, weapons, aircraft parts, flat-panel televisions, satellites, and weapons.

      As part of the two countries ’keenness to stop the trade war that broke out two years ago, the US President signed on January 15th with Chinese Vice Prime Minister Liu a trade agreement, which was described as” historic. ” This agreement is a temporary truce after two years of lean years between the two countries. In light of this agreement, Beijing pledged to purchase additional US goods worth 200 billion dollars in the next two years, and the agreement to protect intellectual property was also requested by Washington. Observers believe that the agreement could open the way for the two parties to end the state of trade instability between them.

    And the first stage of this agreement could work to reduce the conflict that has been going on for two years. Knowing that, in this context, Washington agreed not to increase the customs taxes imposed on Beijing, while China agreed to import other American products in the future at a value of 200 billion dollars. Knowing that the trade war between Beijing and Washington that broke out two years ago has already caused the slowdown in the international economy, which prompted the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to assess its growth forecasts since 2019.

     After a series of recent decisions by the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020, both countries concluded a binding agreement between the two parties, which is considered a historic pause to “suspend the unprecedented trade war between the two largest economic powers in the world. Beijing also pledged to buy additional US goods worth $ 200 billion in the coming years, and the agreement also saw provisions for the protection of intellectual property and conditions for the transfer of knowledge in its various forms. With Beijing.

     Therefore, the trade war is still going on between the two giants of the global economy, and we can say that this agreement is nothing but a truce until both countries think again to evaluate the current situation.