Trump’s new tariff strategy could redraw the global map of coffee and cocoa trade

By: Trademagazin Date: 2025. 07. 30. 11:48

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Tropical agricultural products such as coffee and cocoa may be exempt from tariffs when exported to the United States in the future, if a bilateral trade agreement is reached with the exporting country, announced US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick. The first winner of the measure could be Indonesia, while the world’s largest coffee exporter, Brazil, could face serious losses, the vg.hu article points out.

Lutnick emphasized in an interview with CNBC that President Donald Trump supports imported products that the United States cannot produce – these may be exempt from tariffs, provided that an appropriate trade agreement is in place. The preferential list may include coffee, cocoa, mango, pineapple and even cork – the latter, for example, was given the green light in the agreement with the EU.

The newly announced US-Indonesia trade agreement specifically states that raw materials that the US does not have its own resources can enter the country with reduced or zero tariffs. This could mean a tariff reduction of up to 19 percent for coffee and cocoa from Indonesia.

In contrast, Brazil, which provides more than a third of US coffee imports, could be at risk. Since there is no such trade agreement in place between the two countries, Trump could impose tariffs of up to 50 percent on Brazilian products from August 1 – in response to Brazilian judicial actions related to the Bolsonaro case.

The background to the decision is political, but the consequences are economic: US coffee demand is the world’s largest, so any tariff increase could have a direct impact on retail prices, consumer costs and the entire supply chain.