U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday that his administration might  allow the sale of gasoline containing 15 percent ethanol year-round, which could help farmers by firing up corn demand but faces opposition from oil companies.

The proposal marked the latest move by the Trump administration to navigate the rival oil and corn constituencies as they clash over the nation’s biofuels policy. Oil refiners say the Renewable Fuel Standard requiring them to add biofuels into gasoline is costly and displaces petroleum, while the farm sector says the law provides critical support to growers.

The Environmental Protection Agency currently bans the higher ethanol blend, called E15, during summer because of concerns it contributes to smog on hot days — a worry biofuels advocates say is unfounded.

Gasoline typically contains just 10 percent ethanol.

“We’re going to be going probably, probably to 15, and we’re going to be going to a 12-month period,” Trump told reporters during a White House meeting. “We’re going to work out something during the transition period, which is not easy, very complicated.”

Earlier Thursday, EPA spokeswoman Liz Bowman said the agency had been “assessing the legal validity of granting an E15 waiver since last summer” and was awaiting an outcome from discussions with the White House, the Department of Agriculture and Congress before making any final decisions.

Monte Shaw, executive director of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, said the proposed shift to year-round E15 sales would be “very exciting news.”

“It would be a great morale boost for rural America, and more importantly a real demand boost if it can be moved forward quickly,” he said in an interview.

Annual biofuels figure

Under the RFS, the EPA sets the volume of ethanol and other biofuels that must be mixed into the nation’s fuel supply on a yearly basis — and a move to expand E15 sales could encourage the EPA to set those volumes higher in coming years.

Currently, refiners are required to blend around 15 billion gallons of ethanol into the nation’s fuel annually.

Shares of major biofuels producers rose slightly after the announcement. Archer Daniels Midland Co shares gained 2.7 percent to close at $45.30.

It was unclear, however, whether the move would help the refining sector — which has been lobbying hard instead for a cap on the price of blending credits that refiners must acquire to prove compliance with the RFS.

Greater blending of ethanol through year-round E15 sales would theoretically increase supplies of the tradable credits, and thus reduce prices. But at the same time, more ethanol translates to a smaller share of petroleum-based fuel in American gas tanks, which would hurt refiner sales.

The American Petroleum Institute, which represents big oil companies, issued a statement opposing Trump’s proposal to expand E15 sales, arguing that high-ethanol fuel can damage engines and is incompatible with certain boats, motorcycles and lawn mowers.

“The industry plans to consider all options to prevent such a waiver. The RFS is broken and we continue to believe the best solution is comprehensive legislation,” API Downstream Group Director Frank Macchiarola said in the statement.

Refiners’ shares were mixed after Trump’s comments, with Andeavor closing down 2.6 percent at $110.13 and Valero Energy Corp. up 0.2 percent at $100.53.
…

President Donald Trump on Thursday ordered his top economic and trade advisers to look into rejoining the Pacific Rim trade pact that he abandoned last year three days after taking power.

Farm-state lawmakers said after a White House meeting on agricultural trade that Trump told his economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to weigh the benefits of re-entering the Trans-Pacific Partnership — a deal struck by the Obama administration.

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse, a Republican critic of Trump’s trade policies, said that at one point in the meeting, the president turned to Kudlow and said, “Larry, go get it done.”

Sasse represents a Midwestern farm state. He called Trump’s change of mind on the Pacific trade deal “good news.” He said the president has consistently “reaffirmed the idea that TPP would be easier for us to join now.”

Early Friday, Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso said he would welcome a move by the United States to rejoin the TPP. 

Aso, speaking to reporters after a cabinet meeting, also said that he expected Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Trump to discuss TPP at their summit meeting next week.

Trump has often said he prefers bilateral trade deals instead of multinational pacts, believing the U.S. does not fare well in bigger trade deals. It was not immediately clear why he now is open to rejoining the TPP.

Trump said throughout his presidential campaign “The Trans-Pacific Partnership is another disaster done and pushed by special interests who want to rape our country, just a continuing rape of our country. That’s what it is, too. It’s a harsh word: It’s a rape of our country.”

During opening statements at Thursday’s meeting before he shooed out reporters, Trump assured the lawmakers that he intends to negotiate better trade deals for the American farmer in the face of threatened new Chinese tariffs and contentious negotiations with Canada and Mexico.

“It’ll be very good when we get it all finished,” Trump said. “The farmers will do fantastically well. Agriculture will be taken care of 100 percent.”

Trump contended that “China has consistently treated the American farmer very poorly,” noting that Beijing had until last year blocked U.S. beef sales for 14 years.

Now, in response to Trump’s announced intention to impose new or higher tariffs on $150 billion worth of Chinese imports, China says it will impose new levies on an array of U.S. exports, including wheat, soybeans, corn, cranberries and orange juice, raising fears among U.S. farmers that their livelihoods are threatened.

Administration officials have said China and the United States can negotiate their differences and avoid a trade war.

Trump said Thursday “we’re having some great discussions” with China and that he believes the outcome will be “tariffs off and the barriers down.”

But a spokesman for China’s commerce ministry said the United States is not showing any sincerity and that China will not hesitate to fight back if the U.S. escalates trade tensions.

VOA’s Kenneth Schwartz contributed to this report. Some information for this report came from Reuters.
…

President Donald Trump on Thursday ordered his top economic and trade advisers to look into rejoining the Pacific Rim trade pact that he abandoned last year three days after taking power.

Farm-state lawmakers said after a White House meeting on agricultural trade that Trump told his economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to weigh the benefits of re-entering the Trans-Pacific Partnership — a deal struck by the Obama administration.

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse, a Republican critic of Trump’s trade policies, said that at one point in the meeting, the president turned to Kudlow and said, “Larry, go get it done.”

Sasse represents a Midwestern farm state. He called Trump’s change of mind on the Pacific trade deal “good news.” He said the president has consistently “reaffirmed the idea that TPP would be easier for us to join now.”

Early Friday, Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso said he would welcome a move by the United States to rejoin the TPP. 

Aso, speaking to reporters after a cabinet meeting, also said that he expected Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Trump to discuss TPP at their summit meeting next week.

Trump has often said he prefers bilateral trade deals instead of multinational pacts, believing the U.S. does not fare well in bigger trade deals. It was not immediately clear why he now is open to rejoining the TPP.

Trump said throughout his presidential campaign “The Trans-Pacific Partnership is another disaster done and pushed by special interests who want to rape our country, just a continuing rape of our country. That’s what it is, too. It’s a harsh word: It’s a rape of our country.”

During opening statements at Thursday’s meeting before he shooed out reporters, Trump assured the lawmakers that he intends to negotiate better trade deals for the American farmer in the face of threatened new Chinese tariffs and contentious negotiations with Canada and Mexico.

“It’ll be very good when we get it all finished,” Trump said. “The farmers will do fantastically well. Agriculture will be taken care of 100 percent.”

Trump contended that “China has consistently treated the American farmer very poorly,” noting that Beijing had until last year blocked U.S. beef sales for 14 years.

Now, in response to Trump’s announced intention to impose new or higher tariffs on $150 billion worth of Chinese imports, China says it will impose new levies on an array of U.S. exports, including wheat, soybeans, corn, cranberries and orange juice, raising fears among U.S. farmers that their livelihoods are threatened.

Administration officials have said China and the United States can negotiate their differences and avoid a trade war.

Trump said Thursday “we’re having some great discussions” with China and that he believes the outcome will be “tariffs off and the barriers down.”

But a spokesman for China’s commerce ministry said the United States is not showing any sincerity and that China will not hesitate to fight back if the U.S. escalates trade tensions.

VOA’s Kenneth Schwartz contributed to this report. Some information for this report came from Reuters.
…

The World Trade Organization predicts continued trade growth this year, though it warns that tensions and “tit-for-tat” retaliatory measures, notably between the U.S. and China, could compromise those projections.

WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo laid out the trade body’s predictions at a news conference Thursday amid concerns about a trade war over U.S. President Donald Trump’s planned tariffs on Chinese and other goods and Beijing’s retaliation.

As it stands, the forecast is for 4.4 percent growth in merchandise trade volumes in 2018, easing to 4 percent next year. That’s down from 4.7 percent in 2017.

The WTO is pointing to “broadly positive signs” in world trade but says they face headwinds from “a rising tide of anti-trade sentiment and the increased willingness of governments to employ restrictive trade measures.”
…

Thousands of megawatts of wind and solar energy contracts in the Mekong region of Southeast Asia have been signed, seriously challenging the financial viability of major hydropower projects on the river, an energy expert told a water conference last week.

Buoyed by a recent Thai government decision to delay a power purchase deal with a major mainstream Mekong dam, clean-energy proponents and economists told the third Mekong River Commission summit that the regional energy market was on the cusp of a technological revolution.

Brian Eyler, director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Stimson Center, a nonprofit in Washington dedicated to enhancing global peace and security, said 6,000 megawatts’ worth of wind and solar contracts had been signed in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Laos in the last six months.

He said that in January 2017, he and his colleagues had suggested that more solar and wind energy projects be incorporated into Cambodia’s power development plan, the prospect of which had been “basically off the table” at the time. “In a year’s time, Cambodia has entirely restructured its energy sector” to emphasize solar projects in the country, “and if Cambodia’s doing it, you can bet that the other countries are doing it as well.”

Two gigawatts of wind and solar projects were announced in Vietnam in February and March alone according to a spreadsheet provided by the Stimson Center.

Hyunjung Lee, senior energy economist at the Asian Development Bank’s Southeast Asia Energy Division, said technologies such as wind and solar power were “going to hit the region very significantly, in my view.”

“The atmosphere in the region has been changed,” she said, even in just the past year. “We see a lot of development can happen in solar and wind in the region,” though more integrated approaches were needed.

Lee said the ADB was working to set up a Regional Power Coordination Center that would mimic a highly successful project in southern Africa to create an efficient, integrated regional market.

Impact on river system

A six-year Mekong River Commission Council study on development plans for the Mekong, which was the focus of the summit, suggested catastrophic impacts upon the health of the river system if all planned hydropower dams — 11 mainstream projects and more than 100 on tributaries — were built.

In a January report, the International Renewable Energy Agency found that the cost of electricity generated by solar facilities that supply utilities had fallen by 73 percent from 2010 to 2017, and the cost was forecast to be cut in half again by 2020. 

At that price trajectory, the cost of solar power would fall below that of hydropower by 2020, long before many planned Mekong dams go online.

Global solar capacity grew 32 percent, adding 94 gigawatts in 2017, while renewables across the board increased by 8.3 percent, the IREA survey of 15,000 data points found. Renewables and solar grew faster in Asia than anywhere else in the world, while the amount of hydropower commissioned across the globe was the lowest in a decade.

Wang Wenling, an assistant professor at Yunnan University’s Institute of International Rivers and Eco-Security, said she had just seen firsthand how far the price of solar technology had plummeted on a recent trip to North Carolina in the United States.

“I was super surprised how their solar power production cost per unit is actually cheaper than hydropower. I don’t know how they make it — it’s almost impossible for me — but their cost is only about 15 percent of the cost in China,” she said.

“So I think we have a lot of alternatives and it needs to be considered,” she said.

Some participants, particularly from Laos and Cambodia, remained skeptical of the technology.

“I think we need some more figures,” said a Cambodian member of the audience, raising concerns about stability. “We also think about some figure for the comparison between the occupation of the land of hydropower with solar energy.”

Attractive idea for Cambodia

Jake Brunner, program coordinator for the International Union for Conservation of Nature, said the figures for solar were particularly attractive in Cambodia, where land remained relatively cheap, while energy demand was high in neighboring southern Vietnam.

“We calculated that if you took one 10,000-hectare economic land concession in Cambodia, for example, and you made some very conservative assumptions, you could generate about 3 gigawatts, which is pretty close to Cambodia’s entire national consumption,” he said.

Land is a particularly sensitive issue in Cambodia, where rights group Licadho says more than half a million people have been affected by land conflicts.

Gregory Thomas, executive director of the Natural Heritage Institute, told the summit his organization had researched a solar photo-voltaic alternative for Cambodia that didn’t require any land at all.

Instead of building the massive planned Sambor dam on the Mekong, a “no dam alternative” study commissioned by the Cambodian government had recommended placing solar cells on the existing reservoir of the Lower Sesan II dam in Stung Treng.

“The advantage of integrating solar arrays on a hydropower reservoir that already exists is that you can use the unoccupied space on the reservoir without any land use conflicts whatsoever,” he said. “And, of course, the reservoir storage acts as a battery, essentially, to backstop the intermittent nature of the solar generation.”

Such a project could be cost-competitive and go online much more quickly than a hydropower dam, with 100 megwatts deployable in year, he said.

Floating solar projects are being developed around the world, including in China, where an enormous 150-megawatt installation on a lake that used to be a deserted coal mine is expected to go online in May, powering 15,000 homes.
…

Thousands of megawatts of wind and solar energy contracts in the Mekong region of Southeast Asia have been signed, seriously challenging the financial viability of major hydropower projects on the river, an energy expert told a water conference last week.

Buoyed by a recent Thai government decision to delay a power purchase deal with a major mainstream Mekong dam, clean-energy proponents and economists told the third Mekong River Commission summit that the regional energy market was on the cusp of a technological revolution.

Brian Eyler, director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Stimson Center, a nonprofit in Washington dedicated to enhancing global peace and security, said 6,000 megawatts’ worth of wind and solar contracts had been signed in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Laos in the last six months.

He said that in January 2017, he and his colleagues had suggested that more solar and wind energy projects be incorporated into Cambodia’s power development plan, the prospect of which had been “basically off the table” at the time. “In a year’s time, Cambodia has entirely restructured its energy sector” to emphasize solar projects in the country, “and if Cambodia’s doing it, you can bet that the other countries are doing it as well.”

Two gigawatts of wind and solar projects were announced in Vietnam in February and March alone according to a spreadsheet provided by the Stimson Center.

Hyunjung Lee, senior energy economist at the Asian Development Bank’s Southeast Asia Energy Division, said technologies such as wind and solar power were “going to hit the region very significantly, in my view.”

“The atmosphere in the region has been changed,” she said, even in just the past year. “We see a lot of development can happen in solar and wind in the region,” though more integrated approaches were needed.

Lee said the ADB was working to set up a Regional Power Coordination Center that would mimic a highly successful project in southern Africa to create an efficient, integrated regional market.

Impact on river system

A six-year Mekong River Commission Council study on development plans for the Mekong, which was the focus of the summit, suggested catastrophic impacts upon the health of the river system if all planned hydropower dams — 11 mainstream projects and more than 100 on tributaries — were built.

In a January report, the International Renewable Energy Agency found that the cost of electricity generated by solar facilities that supply utilities had fallen by 73 percent from 2010 to 2017, and the cost was forecast to be cut in half again by 2020. 

At that price trajectory, the cost of solar power would fall below that of hydropower by 2020, long before many planned Mekong dams go online.

Global solar capacity grew 32 percent, adding 94 gigawatts in 2017, while renewables across the board increased by 8.3 percent, the IREA survey of 15,000 data points found. Renewables and solar grew faster in Asia than anywhere else in the world, while the amount of hydropower commissioned across the globe was the lowest in a decade.

Wang Wenling, an assistant professor at Yunnan University’s Institute of International Rivers and Eco-Security, said she had just seen firsthand how far the price of solar technology had plummeted on a recent trip to North Carolina in the United States.

“I was super surprised how their solar power production cost per unit is actually cheaper than hydropower. I don’t know how they make it — it’s almost impossible for me — but their cost is only about 15 percent of the cost in China,” she said.

“So I think we have a lot of alternatives and it needs to be considered,” she said.

Some participants, particularly from Laos and Cambodia, remained skeptical of the technology.

“I think we need some more figures,” said a Cambodian member of the audience, raising concerns about stability. “We also think about some figure for the comparison between the occupation of the land of hydropower with solar energy.”

Attractive idea for Cambodia

Jake Brunner, program coordinator for the International Union for Conservation of Nature, said the figures for solar were particularly attractive in Cambodia, where land remained relatively cheap, while energy demand was high in neighboring southern Vietnam.

“We calculated that if you took one 10,000-hectare economic land concession in Cambodia, for example, and you made some very conservative assumptions, you could generate about 3 gigawatts, which is pretty close to Cambodia’s entire national consumption,” he said.

Land is a particularly sensitive issue in Cambodia, where rights group Licadho says more than half a million people have been affected by land conflicts.

Gregory Thomas, executive director of the Natural Heritage Institute, told the summit his organization had researched a solar photo-voltaic alternative for Cambodia that didn’t require any land at all.

Instead of building the massive planned Sambor dam on the Mekong, a “no dam alternative” study commissioned by the Cambodian government had recommended placing solar cells on the existing reservoir of the Lower Sesan II dam in Stung Treng.

“The advantage of integrating solar arrays on a hydropower reservoir that already exists is that you can use the unoccupied space on the reservoir without any land use conflicts whatsoever,” he said. “And, of course, the reservoir storage acts as a battery, essentially, to backstop the intermittent nature of the solar generation.”

Such a project could be cost-competitive and go online much more quickly than a hydropower dam, with 100 megwatts deployable in year, he said.

Floating solar projects are being developed around the world, including in China, where an enormous 150-megawatt installation on a lake that used to be a deserted coal mine is expected to go online in May, powering 15,000 homes.
…

Since 1980 when he began farming in Illinois, Brent Scholl’s mornings have consisted of a similar routine … waking early to head out to one of several buildings to check in on hundreds of his pigs.

“Every eight weeks, we get 1,100 pigs delivered to us,” Scholl told VOA while tending to a feeding system for his hogs, which he raises for several months before sending them to market. “In a year’s time, we sell over 6,000 pigs.”

It’s a costly and labor intensive – but sometimes profitable – process, which Scholl attributes to increased foreign demand for pork.

“Every fourth hog of mine goes overseas somewhere,” he said. “So that’s 25 to 28 percent of what I am making coming from foreign dollars.”

Foreign dollars at risk if China’s proposed 25 percent tariff on U.S. pork products – a response to U.S. tariffs on Chinese aluminum and steel – is implemented later this year. 

“If that all goes away it’s a losing business,” Scholl said.

Small profit margin

The increasing trade tension between the United States and China has rattled farmers in the American heartland, where many of the products on which China seeks to impose a tariff are produced. Many farmers like Scholl are increasingly wary about how tariffs will impact their income. 

“I heard one say that the difference between losing money and making money at this point is exports, and so if he doesn’t have as many exports as he did last year, he’s going to lose money,” explained Tamara Nelsen, Senior Director of Commodities for the Illinois Farm Bureau, who added that after several years of declining farm income due largely to increased input costs, tariffs will only take away more money from a farmer’s dwindling bottom line. 

“Even though China’s tariff might only be 25 percent, the market might get nervous enough on a given day to have it be a greater discount than that. That just makes it hard for a farmer to make money.” 

And it’s not just for profits from pork. 

Brent Scholl also farms soybeans, and China’s threat to impose a tariff on that commodity has already cost Scholl money. 

“Yesterday, the market went down over 50 cents,” he noted.

Domestic politics

Scholl is concerned China will look elsewhere to obtain cheaper commodities, limiting a key market for U.S. products. He feels there is only one person to blame for his uncertain financial outlook.

“Right now, I would say our president,” he said.

A president Scholl voted for in the 2016 election, despite Trump’s tough talk on trade agreements.

Talking with reporters before a recent Cabinet meeting at the White House, Trump addressed farmers’ concerns with his trade policies.

“If we do a deal with China, if during the course of a negotiation they want to hit the farmers because they think that hits me, I wouldn’t say that’s nice,” said Trump. “But I tell you, our farmers are great patriots. These are great patriots. They understand that they’re doing this for the country. And we’ll make it up to them. And in the end, they’re going to be much stronger than they are right now.”

With the U.S. withdrawal from the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement, or TPP, last year, and more recently the re-negotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement, also known as NAFTA, compounded with potential Chinese tariffs on the key products Scholl raises, it’s a challenging time for U.S. farmers. Scholl admits he has some buyer’s remorse for supporting Trump.

“I thought he was the lesser of two evils,” he told VOA. “I don’t know what I’m thinking right now.”

Scholl is holding out hope President Trump’s trade tactics will work in protecting American jobs and ultimately realizing better trade deals. 

If not, Scholl says it could influence his decision at the ballot box in the next presidential election.
…

Since 1980 when he began farming in Illinois, Brent Scholl’s mornings have consisted of a similar routine … waking early to head out to one of several buildings to check in on hundreds of his pigs.

“Every eight weeks, we get 1,100 pigs delivered to us,” Scholl told VOA while tending to a feeding system for his hogs, which he raises for several months before sending them to market. “In a year’s time, we sell over 6,000 pigs.”

It’s a costly and labor intensive – but sometimes profitable – process, which Scholl attributes to increased foreign demand for pork.

“Every fourth hog of mine goes overseas somewhere,” he said. “So that’s 25 to 28 percent of what I am making coming from foreign dollars.”

Foreign dollars at risk if China’s proposed 25 percent tariff on U.S. pork products – a response to U.S. tariffs on Chinese aluminum and steel – is implemented later this year. 

“If that all goes away it’s a losing business,” Scholl said.

Small profit margin

The increasing trade tension between the United States and China has rattled farmers in the American heartland, where many of the products on which China seeks to impose a tariff are produced. Many farmers like Scholl are increasingly wary about how tariffs will impact their income. 

“I heard one say that the difference between losing money and making money at this point is exports, and so if he doesn’t have as many exports as he did last year, he’s going to lose money,” explained Tamara Nelsen, Senior Director of Commodities for the Illinois Farm Bureau, who added that after several years of declining farm income due largely to increased input costs, tariffs will only take away more money from a farmer’s dwindling bottom line. 

“Even though China’s tariff might only be 25 percent, the market might get nervous enough on a given day to have it be a greater discount than that. That just makes it hard for a farmer to make money.” 

And it’s not just for profits from pork. 

Brent Scholl also farms soybeans, and China’s threat to impose a tariff on that commodity has already cost Scholl money. 

“Yesterday, the market went down over 50 cents,” he noted.

Domestic politics

Scholl is concerned China will look elsewhere to obtain cheaper commodities, limiting a key market for U.S. products. He feels there is only one person to blame for his uncertain financial outlook.

“Right now, I would say our president,” he said.

A president Scholl voted for in the 2016 election, despite Trump’s tough talk on trade agreements.

Talking with reporters before a recent Cabinet meeting at the White House, Trump addressed farmers’ concerns with his trade policies.

“If we do a deal with China, if during the course of a negotiation they want to hit the farmers because they think that hits me, I wouldn’t say that’s nice,” said Trump. “But I tell you, our farmers are great patriots. These are great patriots. They understand that they’re doing this for the country. And we’ll make it up to them. And in the end, they’re going to be much stronger than they are right now.”

With the U.S. withdrawal from the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement, or TPP, last year, and more recently the re-negotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement, also known as NAFTA, compounded with potential Chinese tariffs on the key products Scholl raises, it’s a challenging time for U.S. farmers. Scholl admits he has some buyer’s remorse for supporting Trump.

“I thought he was the lesser of two evils,” he told VOA. “I don’t know what I’m thinking right now.”

Scholl is holding out hope President Trump’s trade tactics will work in protecting American jobs and ultimately realizing better trade deals. 

If not, Scholl says it could influence his decision at the ballot box in the next presidential election.
…

The increasing trade tensions between the United States and China has rattled farmers in the American heartland, the place where many of the products on which China seeks to impose a tariff are produced.  As VOA’s Kane Farabaugh reports, those farmers, once supportive of President Trump, are increasingly wary about his stance on global trade, and ultimately, how it will impact their bottom line.
…

The increasing trade tensions between the United States and China has rattled farmers in the American heartland, the place where many of the products on which China seeks to impose a tariff are produced.  As VOA’s Kane Farabaugh reports, those farmers, once supportive of President Trump, are increasingly wary about his stance on global trade, and ultimately, how it will impact their bottom line.
…

The head of the International Monetary Fund is warning that the global trading system is in danger of being “torn apart.”  

In a speech prepared for delivery in Hong Kong Wednesday, Christine Lagarde urged nations to “steer clear of protectionism.”  That may be a reference to Washington’s recent moves to slap large tariffs on imported steel and other products.  China responded by raising tariffs on U.S.-made products, beginning a cycle that some experts warn could escalate further into a trade war.

Lagarde says the benefits of trade far outweigh the costs and has credited unfettered global trade for drastically reducing the number of people around the world living in extreme poverty.  Lagarde and other experts say everyone loses in trade wars, particularly the 800 million people around the world who, the World Bank says, remain mired in poverty.

While Lagarde’s comments implied criticism of the Trump administration, she also urged nations, presumably including China, to do a better job of protecting intellectual property. President Trump and many foreign businesses operating in China have complained that they are pressured to turn over technology secrets to Chinese partner companies in exchange for access to the huge Chinese market.  She also urged economic reforms, including ending policies that unfairly favor state-owned enterprises.

Lagarde says the global economy is experiencing a strong upswing, and says now is the time for nations to make economic reforms such as opening up the service sector in developing economies, and doing more to use digital technology to improve the the delivery of government public services. She warns that economic reform is more urgent now because of the growing uncertainties arising from trade tensions, uncertain geopolitics and rising fiscal and financial risks.

Lagarde’s speech comes ahead of next week’s meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington, where top economic and financial leaders and experts from around the world will gather to seek solutions to problems in banking, trade, deficits and many other topics.
…

The head of the International Monetary Fund is warning that the global trading system is in danger of being “torn apart.”  

In a speech prepared for delivery in Hong Kong Wednesday, Christine Lagarde urged nations to “steer clear of protectionism.”  That may be a reference to Washington’s recent moves to slap large tariffs on imported steel and other products.  China responded by raising tariffs on U.S.-made products, beginning a cycle that some experts warn could escalate further into a trade war.

Lagarde says the benefits of trade far outweigh the costs and has credited unfettered global trade for drastically reducing the number of people around the world living in extreme poverty.  Lagarde and other experts say everyone loses in trade wars, particularly the 800 million people around the world who, the World Bank says, remain mired in poverty.

While Lagarde’s comments implied criticism of the Trump administration, she also urged nations, presumably including China, to do a better job of protecting intellectual property. President Trump and many foreign businesses operating in China have complained that they are pressured to turn over technology secrets to Chinese partner companies in exchange for access to the huge Chinese market.  She also urged economic reforms, including ending policies that unfairly favor state-owned enterprises.

Lagarde says the global economy is experiencing a strong upswing, and says now is the time for nations to make economic reforms such as opening up the service sector in developing economies, and doing more to use digital technology to improve the the delivery of government public services. She warns that economic reform is more urgent now because of the growing uncertainties arising from trade tensions, uncertain geopolitics and rising fiscal and financial risks.

Lagarde’s speech comes ahead of next week’s meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington, where top economic and financial leaders and experts from around the world will gather to seek solutions to problems in banking, trade, deficits and many other topics.
…

Future Russian gas transit flows through Ukraine to Europe may be between 10 and 15 billion cubic metres per year, Alexei Miller, head of Russian gas giant Gazprom, said on Tuesday, which is a significant decline from current levels.

Miller issued his comments after German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the planned new Nord Stream 2 pipeline between Russia and Germany could not go ahead without clarity on Ukraine’s role as a transit route for gas.

“We have never raised an issue about abandoning the Ukrainian transit. However, the Russian resource base has been moving northward and there won’t be the same resources in the central gas transportation corridor as it was in the past,” Miller said in a statement.

“That’s why a certain transit could still be in place, in the amount of 10-15 bcm per year, but the Ukrainian side has to explain the viability of the new transit contract,” he said.

He did not give a time frame for when the transit could be 10-15 bcm a year.

Ukraine has been a key route for carrying Russian gas to Europe where it supplies around a third of gas needs, but Moscow and Kiev have clashed frequently over energy.

Last year, the transit amounted to more than 93 bcm, while Gazprom’s total exports to Europe and Turkey reached an all-time high of 194 bcm.

Last year, Ukraine earned around $3 billion in Russian gas transit fees.

Gazprom said last month it would terminate its gas contracts with Ukraine after it lost a court case, escalating a dispute which had left Ukraine struggling to stay warm and which the European Union said could threaten gas flows to Europe.

A Stockholm arbitration court ordered Gazprom in February to pay more than $2.5 billion to Ukrainian energy firm Naftogaz – a ruling meant to conclude a long legal battle that has run alongside Ukraine’s broader political stand-off with Russia.

Gazprom wants to bypass Ukraine as an export route and plans to build two more undersea gas pipelines to Europe: TurkStream to Turkey and Nord Stream 2 to Germany.

Eastern European and Baltic states fear Nord Stream 2, planned to run through the Baltic Sea, could increase reliance on Russian gas and undermine Ukraine’s role as a gas transit route.

The plans for the pipelines were given new impetus after relations between Moscow and Kiev plunged as Russia-leaning president Viktor Yanukovich fled Ukraine in 2014 following street protests and a pro-Moscow revolt subsequently flared in eastern Ukraine.

The current deal between Russia and Ukraine on gas purchases and transit expires at the end of 2019 and Kiev has been worrying about losing its transfer fees for shipping the Russian gas westwards to Europe.

 
…

Future Russian gas transit flows through Ukraine to Europe may be between 10 and 15 billion cubic metres per year, Alexei Miller, head of Russian gas giant Gazprom, said on Tuesday, which is a significant decline from current levels.

Miller issued his comments after German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the planned new Nord Stream 2 pipeline between Russia and Germany could not go ahead without clarity on Ukraine’s role as a transit route for gas.

“We have never raised an issue about abandoning the Ukrainian transit. However, the Russian resource base has been moving northward and there won’t be the same resources in the central gas transportation corridor as it was in the past,” Miller said in a statement.

“That’s why a certain transit could still be in place, in the amount of 10-15 bcm per year, but the Ukrainian side has to explain the viability of the new transit contract,” he said.

He did not give a time frame for when the transit could be 10-15 bcm a year.

Ukraine has been a key route for carrying Russian gas to Europe where it supplies around a third of gas needs, but Moscow and Kiev have clashed frequently over energy.

Last year, the transit amounted to more than 93 bcm, while Gazprom’s total exports to Europe and Turkey reached an all-time high of 194 bcm.

Last year, Ukraine earned around $3 billion in Russian gas transit fees.

Gazprom said last month it would terminate its gas contracts with Ukraine after it lost a court case, escalating a dispute which had left Ukraine struggling to stay warm and which the European Union said could threaten gas flows to Europe.

A Stockholm arbitration court ordered Gazprom in February to pay more than $2.5 billion to Ukrainian energy firm Naftogaz – a ruling meant to conclude a long legal battle that has run alongside Ukraine’s broader political stand-off with Russia.

Gazprom wants to bypass Ukraine as an export route and plans to build two more undersea gas pipelines to Europe: TurkStream to Turkey and Nord Stream 2 to Germany.

Eastern European and Baltic states fear Nord Stream 2, planned to run through the Baltic Sea, could increase reliance on Russian gas and undermine Ukraine’s role as a gas transit route.

The plans for the pipelines were given new impetus after relations between Moscow and Kiev plunged as Russia-leaning president Viktor Yanukovich fled Ukraine in 2014 following street protests and a pro-Moscow revolt subsequently flared in eastern Ukraine.

The current deal between Russia and Ukraine on gas purchases and transit expires at the end of 2019 and Kiev has been worrying about losing its transfer fees for shipping the Russian gas westwards to Europe.

 
…

Tuesday, April 10, is Equal Pay Day in the United States. Advocates designated the day to mark how much longer women must work, on average, to earn as much as men averaged in the previous year. 

Germany recognized Equal Pay Day on March 10. The Czech Republic will observe it on April 13. While assigning a date to the gender pay gap is a way to make a point, it makes for an easy gauge of whether the pay gap is getting worse or better from one year to the next. In 2017, the U.S. Equal Pay Day was April 4 — meaning the pay gap is slightly worse this year than last.

There are a number of explanations for historic gender gaps in pay.

One of the major ones is known as “occupational segregation,” meaning a particular job is seen as “men’s work” or “women’s work” and is dominated by that gender. In a study by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research in 2017, among the most common occupations for women and for men in the United States, only six occupations overlap.

In the fields that pay best, men tend to dominate, said the IWPR’s Chandra Childers. She adds that when men start to leave a field and women start to move in, the average pay for that field begins to drop.

Some say the pay gap is due to more women taking time off work or assuming less demanding professional roles so they can care for their families. “Women often choose lower-paying jobs that are closer to home and have better, more flexible hours,” conservative commentator Carrie Lukas said in an April 4 column for Forbes.

Childers says she hears that argument often. But “when you look at the pay gap,” she said, “a lot of it is because women are concentrated in low-wage service jobs. Many of these jobs are not flexible. They’re not family friendly,” and they are less likely to have paid family leave.

The Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think tank that advocates for low- and middle-income workers, found in April 2017 that women are paid less than their male colleagues in almost every occupation, regardless of whether that occupation is traditionally held by men or women. The average wage for preschool and kindergarten teachers was $16.33 per hour for men, and $14.42 per hour for women. Male nurse practitioners made $42.74 an hour, compared to $37.50 per hour for female nurse practitioners. Male software developers made $38.98 an hour, while women software developers made an average $33.65 an hour.

#MeToo movement

Hollywood has recently gotten much attention for starkly different salaries paid to women and men working on the same project. To highlight this point, several high-profile actresses turned up at this year’s Academy Awards ceremony with women’s rights activists as their dates.

Actress Meryl Streep brought Ai-jen Poo, the executive director of the National Domestic Workers’ Alliance. Poo used the opportunity to talk about how attitudes toward women — including those behind the sexual harassment scandal wracking the entertainment industry — affect pay levels at both the bottom of the income scale and the top.

“Equal Pay Day looks different in the #MeToo moment,” Poo said in a column in In Style magazine on April 4. “Each #MeToo story amplified the voice of a woman who has been underpaid, shut out, harassed, assaulted, undermined, ignored, or threatened. We can see clearly how it is that women are paid less when the gender discrimination that leads to the wage gap is exposed.”

Poo goes on to say that pay inequality and sexual harassment are “inextricably linked. They are both the result of a culture in which women’s lives and contributions are devalued.”

Oscar-winning actress Octavia Spencer recently told People magazine how she and Oscar nominee Jessica Chastain teamed up for a tiny experiment in collective bargaining, a tool activists recommend to fight against unfair compensation practices. The two women told producers that they would only take the roles if they were paid the same amount. Spencer — the Oscar winner — said she ended up making five times the amount she had expected for the film.

Technology sector

Women also face tough hurdles in the technology sector. A survey by the job-hunting website Hired.com showed that 63 percent of the time, men were offered higher salaries than women for the same role at the same company. The differences in starting pay for the same job ranged from 4 percent to 45 percent.

Notably, the Hired survey found that 54 percent of the women it surveyed said they had found out at some point in their careers that they were making less money than a man with the same job. Only 19 percent of men had had the same experience.

Equal-pay supporters say the benefit of equal pay is not just confined to the individual earners; it also benefits the employer and the community in which it is based.

Power to employees

There’s no silver bullet, says Jessica Schieder of the Economic Policy Institute, but an important tool in the fight for equal pay is transparency.

“You can’t know you’re underpaid and have a problem until that information is available,” Schieder said. She also recommends collective bargaining, a higher minimum wage, and any other tools that give employees more power. The social taboo against talking about personal income, she says, is not helpful either.

Jess Morales Rocketto of the National Domestic Workers Alliance and We Belong Together, a feminist campaign for immigration reform, says there is one other idea that can’t be overlooked. “There’s nothing more powerful than women coming together. … In the next 10 years, I want to see us close the pay gap. But also, I want ALL working people to be covered by our labor laws. And I want women at every level of public office.

“Our job is to address all forms of gender inequality to ensure that no woman, regardless of where she’s from, is left behind,” she said.
…

China’s President Xi Jinping did not mention U.S. President Donald Trump by name or speak directly about rising trade frictions with Washington during a closely watched speech at the Boao Forum — China’s version of Davos for Asia.

But the pledges Xi made to press forward with economic reforms had everything to do with the trade dispute and President Trump’s threats to levy heavy tariffs on Chinese goods.

In his speech, Xi mentioned the phrase “opening up” 42 times. One of the key messages of his speech was that China was open for business. It was also an effort, one analyst said, to highlight a contrast between Beijing’s approach and Washington.

“I want to clearly tell everyone, China’s door for opening will not close, but will only open wider,” Xi said. “Cold war mentality and zero sum game are more and more old-fashioned and outdated. Isolationism will only hit walls.”

Car imports

In his speech, Xi said China would launch a number of landmark measures this year, including cutting tariffs on car imports, one key trade barrier President Trump has mentioned repeatedly. China places a 25 percent tariff on automobile imports, while Chinese vehicles exported to the United States are taxed by two and half percent.

Xi re-stated a pledge to open up China’s financial sector — easing restrictions — and accelerate the opening up of the insurance industry.

He also said China would restructure its State Intellectual Property Office this year to step up law enforcement, raise fines for violations and strengthen legal protections.

Xi did not give a specific timeframe, but said the reforms would take place “sooner rather than later, faster rather than slower.”

Some analysts said the pledges were nothing new and unlikely to amount to the type of concessions that the Trump administration is expecting. Others, however, said there might be enough there to at least help the two move toward sitting down to talk.

“President Xi gave the outline and the many details and the concrete measures we are still waiting to see what policies will come up in the following days,” said Zhang Yifan, an associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. “But he mentioned balanced trade, that means that they will address the trade surplus issue, not just with the U.S., but with all other countries.”

The United States has proposed placing tariffs on about 1,300 Chinese imports, which amounts to about $50 billion in trade. Late last week, even as he disagreed with the characterization of the dispute as a trade war, President Trump upped the stakes by asking for $100 billion more in tariffs.

China has responded with a list of its own, some 106 products that target among other things agricultural production in areas where political support for Trump was strong in the 2016 elections.

Beijing has already put a 25 percent tariff in place on pork products, in response to Trump’s earlier tariffs on steel and aluminum. And if Beijing’s recently announced tariffs go forward, soybean imports from the United States could also face a 25 percent tariff.

The impact that could have on American farmers is already raising concerns. So much so that the White House announced Monday it is drafting up a plan to protect farmers and make sure they don’t bear the brunt of Chinese retaliation.

That is why it is hard to predict just how far Xi’s remarks may go in helping the two sides resolve their differences, said Oliver Rui, a professor of international finance and accounting at the China Europe International Business School.

“The issue is very complicated. It is not just the trade imbalances between the two countries, it is also related to political issues. The mid-term elections will definitely play a role here, the attitude of the EU will also play a role here,” Rui said.

Several days ago the White House chief economic adviser Larry Kudlow said that the Trump administration is building a “coalition of the willing” to jointly take on China over its trade practices. Kudlow has not yet said which countries might be a part of that grouping, but the European Union is one likely partner.

Concern about trade practices

The United States is not the only country concerned about China’s trade practices and increasingly analysts who have been arguing against tariffs have noted that working with other countries could have an even stronger impact.

That is something that President Xi appeared to be hinting at in his speech and that might be a point of concern for Beijing.

“We should pursue the path of dialogue, not conflict, building partnerships and not alliances as we forge new paths in relations between countries,” Xi said.

This story was written by VOA’s William Ide in Beijing. Joyce Huang contributed.
…

China’s President Xi Jinping did not mention U.S. President Donald Trump by name or speak directly about rising trade frictions with Washington during a closely watched speech at the Boao Forum — China’s version of Davos for Asia.

But the pledges Xi made to press forward with economic reforms had everything to do with the trade dispute and President Trump’s threats to levy heavy tariffs on Chinese goods.

In his speech, Xi mentioned the phrase “opening up” 42 times. One of the key messages of his speech was that China was open for business. It was also an effort, one analyst said, to highlight a contrast between Beijing’s approach and Washington.

“I want to clearly tell everyone, China’s door for opening will not close, but will only open wider,” Xi said. “Cold war mentality and zero sum game are more and more old-fashioned and outdated. Isolationism will only hit walls.”

Car imports

In his speech, Xi said China would launch a number of landmark measures this year, including cutting tariffs on car imports, one key trade barrier President Trump has mentioned repeatedly. China places a 25 percent tariff on automobile imports, while Chinese vehicles exported to the United States are taxed by two and half percent.

Xi re-stated a pledge to open up China’s financial sector — easing restrictions — and accelerate the opening up of the insurance industry.

He also said China would restructure its State Intellectual Property Office this year to step up law enforcement, raise fines for violations and strengthen legal protections.

Xi did not give a specific timeframe, but said the reforms would take place “sooner rather than later, faster rather than slower.”

Some analysts said the pledges were nothing new and unlikely to amount to the type of concessions that the Trump administration is expecting. Others, however, said there might be enough there to at least help the two move toward sitting down to talk.

“President Xi gave the outline and the many details and the concrete measures we are still waiting to see what policies will come up in the following days,” said Zhang Yifan, an associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. “But he mentioned balanced trade, that means that they will address the trade surplus issue, not just with the U.S., but with all other countries.”

The United States has proposed placing tariffs on about 1,300 Chinese imports, which amounts to about $50 billion in trade. Late last week, even as he disagreed with the characterization of the dispute as a trade war, President Trump upped the stakes by asking for $100 billion more in tariffs.

China has responded with a list of its own, some 106 products that target among other things agricultural production in areas where political support for Trump was strong in the 2016 elections.

Beijing has already put a 25 percent tariff in place on pork products, in response to Trump’s earlier tariffs on steel and aluminum. And if Beijing’s recently announced tariffs go forward, soybean imports from the United States could also face a 25 percent tariff.

The impact that could have on American farmers is already raising concerns. So much so that the White House announced Monday it is drafting up a plan to protect farmers and make sure they don’t bear the brunt of Chinese retaliation.

That is why it is hard to predict just how far Xi’s remarks may go in helping the two sides resolve their differences, said Oliver Rui, a professor of international finance and accounting at the China Europe International Business School.

“The issue is very complicated. It is not just the trade imbalances between the two countries, it is also related to political issues. The mid-term elections will definitely play a role here, the attitude of the EU will also play a role here,” Rui said.

Several days ago the White House chief economic adviser Larry Kudlow said that the Trump administration is building a “coalition of the willing” to jointly take on China over its trade practices. Kudlow has not yet said which countries might be a part of that grouping, but the European Union is one likely partner.

Concern about trade practices

The United States is not the only country concerned about China’s trade practices and increasingly analysts who have been arguing against tariffs have noted that working with other countries could have an even stronger impact.

That is something that President Xi appeared to be hinting at in his speech and that might be a point of concern for Beijing.

“We should pursue the path of dialogue, not conflict, building partnerships and not alliances as we forge new paths in relations between countries,” Xi said.

This story was written by VOA’s William Ide in Beijing. Joyce Huang contributed.
…

Brazil’s government has been told that development projects, including hydropower dams, in protected areas can no longer go ahead without the prior approval of lawmakers.

Last week’s ruling by the supreme court followed the use by the government in recent years of the controversial “provisional measure”, a legal instrument that allowed the president to approve projects by reducing the size of protected areas.

Campaigners said the decision should ensure the country’s forests and reserves, including the Amazon rainforest, were better protected.

“This decision puts an end to a spree of provisional measures in the name of environmental de-protection,” said Mauricio Guetta, a lawyer at Instituto Socioambiental (ISA), an advocacy group.

In recent years, the government has used the measure to open up protected areas for controversial projects, including building two of Brazil’s largest hydropower dams – the Jirau and Santo Antonio – in the Amazon.

The use of the measure to shrink protected areas with immediate effect had brought “irreversible consequences, irreversible damage to the environment,” Guetta told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone.

The eight-judge bench ruled unanimously that using the provisional measure to reduce the size of protected areas for any reason was unconstitutional.

It followed a lawsuit in which the court heard the measure had been used in 2012 to allow trees in six protected areas of the Amazon to be felled to make way for five hydropower dams.

“The (provisional measure), later converted into law, reduced the level of environmental protection by deactivating due legislative process,” supreme court justice Alexandre de Moraes said in a statement.

The court said the ruling would not affect the five hydropower plants in question because the provisional measure had already been enacted in law, and some are operating.

Guetta said the ruling meant any changes to protected areas must be first approved by law, and local communities should be properly consulted about projects planned on their land.

“The government has been trying to reduce by more than 1 million hectares the area under conservation in the southern part of Amazonas state. Now this initiative is officially vetoed because of the supreme court’s decision,” he said.

Environmentalists say increasing swaths of land, including the Amazon forest, are being felled for grazing and cropland, and for development projects.

Deforestation in the Amazon fell in the August 2016 to July 2017 monitoring period for the first time in three years, although the 6,624 square kilometers (2,557 square miles) cleared of forest remains well above the low recorded in 2012 and targets for slowing climate change.
…

Brazil’s government has been told that development projects, including hydropower dams, in protected areas can no longer go ahead without the prior approval of lawmakers.

Last week’s ruling by the supreme court followed the use by the government in recent years of the controversial “provisional measure”, a legal instrument that allowed the president to approve projects by reducing the size of protected areas.

Campaigners said the decision should ensure the country’s forests and reserves, including the Amazon rainforest, were better protected.

“This decision puts an end to a spree of provisional measures in the name of environmental de-protection,” said Mauricio Guetta, a lawyer at Instituto Socioambiental (ISA), an advocacy group.

In recent years, the government has used the measure to open up protected areas for controversial projects, including building two of Brazil’s largest hydropower dams – the Jirau and Santo Antonio – in the Amazon.

The use of the measure to shrink protected areas with immediate effect had brought “irreversible consequences, irreversible damage to the environment,” Guetta told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone.

The eight-judge bench ruled unanimously that using the provisional measure to reduce the size of protected areas for any reason was unconstitutional.

It followed a lawsuit in which the court heard the measure had been used in 2012 to allow trees in six protected areas of the Amazon to be felled to make way for five hydropower dams.

“The (provisional measure), later converted into law, reduced the level of environmental protection by deactivating due legislative process,” supreme court justice Alexandre de Moraes said in a statement.

The court said the ruling would not affect the five hydropower plants in question because the provisional measure had already been enacted in law, and some are operating.

Guetta said the ruling meant any changes to protected areas must be first approved by law, and local communities should be properly consulted about projects planned on their land.

“The government has been trying to reduce by more than 1 million hectares the area under conservation in the southern part of Amazonas state. Now this initiative is officially vetoed because of the supreme court’s decision,” he said.

Environmentalists say increasing swaths of land, including the Amazon forest, are being felled for grazing and cropland, and for development projects.

Deforestation in the Amazon fell in the August 2016 to July 2017 monitoring period for the first time in three years, although the 6,624 square kilometers (2,557 square miles) cleared of forest remains well above the low recorded in 2012 and targets for slowing climate change.
…

Afghanistan is set to exploit its unique agricultural climate by refining and exporting another kind of flower, orange blossoms! An Afghan investor found a way to extract the citrusy, floral bouquet from the delicate flowers to create perfumes. As VOA’s Zabihullah Ghazi reports in Jalalabad, not only is the perfume diversifying the country’s agricultural output, it’s also providing employment opportunities. Shaista Sadat Lami narrates.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump predicted Sunday there would be a resolution of the U.S.-China standoff on tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars of goods the world’s two biggest economies are threatening to impose on each other.

The U.S. leader said, without offering any direct information, that “China will take down its Trade Barriers because it is the right thing to do.”

Trump said that “taxes will become Reciprocal & a deal will be made on Intellectual Property. Great future for both countries!”

Regardless, Trump said that he and Chinese President Xi Jinping “will always be friends, no matter what happens with our dispute on trade.”

The threats Washington and Beijing have lobbed at each other in recent days have rattled world stock markets, with wide swings of hundreds of points in stock indexes.

U.S. stocks plunged more than 2 percent Friday after Trump threatened to impose tariffs on an additional $100 billion worth of Chinese goods beyond the $50 billion worth of products he had already said would be affected.

Beijing responded in kind, saying it would impose tariffs on U.S. goods “until the end at any cost.”

Both countries have published lists of goods they intend to tax, with the U.S. hitting steel and aluminum imports from China, along with aerospace, tech and machinery goods. Other levies would target medical equipment, medicine and educational materials.

China said it would impose tariffs on more than 100 U.S. products, including soybeans, wheat, corn, beef, tobacco, vehicles, plastic products and an array of other items.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told CBS News that the threat of higher tariffs posed the risk of a trade war but that he does not expect one to materialize.

“Our expectation is that we don’t think there will be a trade war. Our objective is to continue to have discussions with China. I don’t expect there will be a trade war. It could be, but I don’t expect it at all,” he said.

Mnuchin said that Trump and Xi have a “very close relationship” and that the two countries would continue to discuss trade issues.

A key U.S. lawmaker, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, told ABC News, that U.S. businesses and consumers could inevitably be hurt if China imposes tariffs on U.S. products.

“There is no way for us to address China without absorbing some pain here,” Graham said. “To those who believe that China is cheating, what idea do you have better than Trump?”
…

U.S. President Donald Trump predicted Sunday there would be a resolution of the U.S.-China standoff on tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars of goods the world’s two biggest economies are threatening to impose on each other.

The U.S. leader said, without offering any direct information, that “China will take down its Trade Barriers because it is the right thing to do.”

Trump said that “taxes will become Reciprocal & a deal will be made on Intellectual Property. Great future for both countries!”

Regardless, Trump said that he and Chinese President Xi Jinping “will always be friends, no matter what happens with our dispute on trade.”

The threats Washington and Beijing have lobbed at each other in recent days have rattled world stock markets, with wide swings of hundreds of points in stock indexes.

U.S. stocks plunged more than 2 percent Friday after Trump threatened to impose tariffs on an additional $100 billion worth of Chinese goods beyond the $50 billion worth of products he had already said would be affected.

Beijing responded in kind, saying it would impose tariffs on U.S. goods “until the end at any cost.”

Both countries have published lists of goods they intend to tax, with the U.S. hitting steel and aluminum imports from China, along with aerospace, tech and machinery goods. Other levies would target medical equipment, medicine and educational materials.

China said it would impose tariffs on more than 100 U.S. products, including soybeans, wheat, corn, beef, tobacco, vehicles, plastic products and an array of other items.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told CBS News that the threat of higher tariffs posed the risk of a trade war but that he does not expect one to materialize.

“Our expectation is that we don’t think there will be a trade war. Our objective is to continue to have discussions with China. I don’t expect there will be a trade war. It could be, but I don’t expect it at all,” he said.

Mnuchin said that Trump and Xi have a “very close relationship” and that the two countries would continue to discuss trade issues.

A key U.S. lawmaker, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, told ABC News, that U.S. businesses and consumers could inevitably be hurt if China imposes tariffs on U.S. products.

“There is no way for us to address China without absorbing some pain here,” Graham said. “To those who believe that China is cheating, what idea do you have better than Trump?”
…

Taiwan says it regrets that the “one China” policy insisted on by Beijing prevents it from providing much needed development aid to most countries in Africa.

Taiwan was in a relatively good diplomatic position in Africa several years ago. Taiwan’s Deputy Secretary-General for International Cooperation and Development, Pai-po Lee, says this made it possible for those countries that had diplomatic relations with Taiwan to benefit from his agency’s aid projects.

“Previously, we have over nine countries with Taiwan. For instance, Senegal, the Gambia, Chad, Niger, Liberia, Central Africa — also Sao Tome Principe… Six years ago, they still have relations with Taiwan. But, then they shifted to China,” said Pai-po Lee.

Lee says Taiwan had invested a lot in the African region. But, all that is now in the past. He says Taiwan currently maintains diplomatic relations with only two countries — Burkina Faso and Swaziland.

He says Taiwan has been running productive agricultural and livestock, as well as vocational and medical programs in Swaziland since 1975.

As for Burkina Faso, he says a successful irrigation project on the Kou River, which was started in 1967, ended in 1973. That was when Burkina Faso broke off relations with Taiwan in favor of China.

But Lee tells VOA Burkina Faso restored ties with Taiwan in 1994. He suggests the lure of billions of dollars in Chinese aid was not strong enough to keep this impoverished country within Beijing’s diplomatic orbit.

“It is… coming from the Burkina Faso people. To think about the 1967 in Kou River, this 1967. They had quite a good memory of that… So, the people urged the government to restore the relations with Taiwan. So, that pressure comes from the people,” said Lee.

Since resuming development work in Burkina Faso, the Taiwanese development official says the country’s irrigation system has been expanded. He says a program is ongoing to train local nurses and medical doctors and an infant and maternal health program is having great success in reducing both maternal and infant deaths.

This story was written by VOA’s Lisa Schlein

 
…

The U.N. secretary-general and the Singaporean foreign minister voiced concerns about global trade tensions and rising protectionism during back-to-back meetings in Beijing on Sunday.

Following remarks from his Chinese counterpart, Singaporean Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan vowed to “double-down” on free trade and economic liberalization in tandem with China.

“This is a time in the world where the temptation to embark on unilateralism and protectionism is unfortunately rising,” Balakrishnan said.

In a separate meeting, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called China “absolutely crucial” in the international system.

“You mentioned reform and opening up — it’s so important in a moment when some others have a policy of closing up,” Guterres told Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

“The solutions for these problems are not to put globalization to question, but to improve globalization. Not isolation or protectionism, but more international cooperation,” Guterres said.

The comments came as China and the U.S. exchanged escalating tariff threats in what is already shaping up to be the biggest trade battle for more than a half century.

Beijing vowed Friday to “counterattack with great strength” if President Donald Trump follows through on threats to impose tariffs on an additional $100 billion in Chinese goods.

Trump’s announcement followed China’s decision to tax $50 billion in American products, including soybeans and small aircraft, in response to a U.S. move this week to impose tariffs on $50 billion in Chinese goods.

The U.S. bought more than $500 billion in goods from China last year and now is planning or considering penalties on some $150 billion of those imports. The U.S. sold about $130 billion in goods to China in 2017 and faces a potentially devastating hit to its market there if China responds in kind.

In the meetings, Wang attacked what he called “protectionism and unilateralism,” though he didn’t single out the U.S. by name.

“China will safeguard the principles of free trade and oppose protectionism,” Wang said. “We should push forward with economic globalization.”

Wang was welcoming both officials ahead of their planned appearances at the annual Boao Forum for Asia, a Chinese-sponsored annual gathering for political and economic elites on tropical Hainan Island.

Guterres will meet President Xi Jinping later Sunday and also plans to visit the China Peacekeeping Police Training Center.

Balakrishnan is traveling with Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on the first of a five-day visit to China.

This story was written by the Associated Press

 
…