A US Customs and Border Protection notice to shippers provides a three-week exemption for Indian goods that were loaded onto a vessel and in transit to the US before the midnight deadline. These goods can still enter the US at prior lower tariff rates before 12.01am EDT on Sep 17.
Also exempted are steel, aluminium and derivative products, passenger vehicles, copper and other goods subject to separate tariffs of up to 50 per cent under the Section 232 national security trade law.
India trade ministry officials say the average tariff on US imports is around 7.5 per cent, while the US Trade Representative’s office has highlighted rates of up to 100 per cent on autos and an average applied tariff rate of 39 per cent on US farm goods.
FAILED TALKS
As the midnight activation deadline approached, US officials offered no hope for India to avert the tariffs.
“Yeah,” said White House trade adviser Peter Navarro when asked if the increased tariffs on India’s US-bound exports would go into effect as previously announced on Wednesday. He offered no further details.
Wednesday’s tariff move follows five rounds of failed talks, during which Indian officials had signalled optimism that US tariffs could be capped at 15 per cent, the rate granted to goods from some other major US trade partners including Japan, South Korea and the European Union.
Officials on both sides blamed political misjudgment and missed signals for the breakdown in talks between the world’s biggest and fifth-largest economies. Their two-way goods trade totalled US$129 billion in 2024, with a US$45.8 billion US trade deficit, according to US Census Bureau data.
