TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsNo clear winner in US tariff policy among ASEAN countries
US import tariffs vary for goods shipped in from different Southeast Asian countries, with the 19 percent duty faced by Indonesian exporters falling between the extremes.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
United States President Donald Trump looks on during a meeting with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (not pictured) on July 28 at the Trump Turnberry golf club in Turnberry, Scotland, the United Kingdom. (Reuters/Pool/Christopher Furlong)
T
he competition landscape in Southeast Asia has become clearer as the Aug. 1 tariff deadline set by the United States President Donald Trump passed with most countries in the region facing the same hurdle in exporting goods to the world’s largest consumer market.
While there are no clear winners, Laos and Myanmar can be considered losers under a US policy that is shaking up global supply chains, as manufacturers in those countries are subject to a steep 40 percent US import duty.
Brunei Darussalam, meanwhile, got off somewhat lighter with 25 percent, but that is still high within the region.
Singapore received the lowest rate among ASEAN countries with a 10 percent US import tariff, unchanged from what the Trump administration had imposed at the start of Trump’s tariff barrage in April.
However, export activity there involves higher operational costs, says researcher Wen Chong Cheah from the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).
Moreover, pharmaceuticals and semiconductors, two of Singapore’s main export goods, are not among the key exports of any other ASEAN countries, meaning the city state was “less able” to leverage a lower tariff “to gain a competitive edge”, said Cheah.
“Most of ASEAN is [subject to] similar [US import] tariff rates. It seems that we are back at square one. Among Indonesia's competitors in the region, none has a distinct edge in terms of export costs to the US,” he told The Jakarta Post on Monday.
