US tariffs bring stalled shipments and uncertainty for Chinese exporters

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 16/04/2025 (347 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

GUANGZHOU, China (AP) — Exporters at China’s largest trade fair spoke on Wednesday of stalled shipments and lower sales forecasts due to the ongoing trade war with the United States.

Zhang Haiyun, overseas sales director for Airdog, an air purifier maker based in the eastern Chinese city of Suzhou, said her company has halted shipments to the U.S. since President Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs of 145% on all products imported from China.

“Basically, there are no freight companies willing to take orders because no one knows what will happen to the tariffs when the goods arrive,” Zhang told The Associated Press from her booth at the Canton Fair, which is China’s largest and oldest trade event.

Trump’s so-called “reciprocal tariffs” on China, and essentially all other U.S. trading partners, loomed heavily at the biannual fair, which has been held since 1957.

While the U.S. has postponed the implementation of most tariffs for three months, the duties on Chinese products remain in place pending a trade deal between the two nations. Beijing has retaliated with tariffs on U.S. goods that total 125%.

Zhang said the reciprocal tariffs were enacted just as her company’s business in the U.S. had started growing. Airdog sells various models of air purifiers in the U.S. and more than 90 other countries and regions around the world, with a focus on developing countries that have boosted trade with China under Beijing’s Belt and Road initiative.

She said her company was going to wait and see how things develop before moving production to other Southeast Asian countries.

Many Chinese companies have opened factories abroad since Trump’s first term in office in an attempt to avoid reciprocal tariffs between China and the U.S. But in his new round of tariff announcements, Trump targeted Southeast Asian nations with high duties, including 49% tariffs on imports from Cambodia and 46% duties on goods from Vietnam.

China’s President Xi Jinping is this week touring Vietnam, Cambodia and Malaysia, and making a case for free trade.

Exporters across both China and Southeast Asia have expressed concern about the tariffs’ impact on production lines and supply chains.

Wallace Huang, export business director at Weking Group, which makes small appliances such as rice cookers, air fryers and electric kettles, said his company has halted business with the U.S. for the moment.

“We cannot rely on a single market,” Huang said, “We need to diversify our market. When the West is dark, the East is bright.”

Huang said his company’s exports to the U.S. have dropped between 5% and 10% since Trump’s first term in office, and that his company is looking to sell more to other developing nations.

Angel Li, a senior sales executive for Great Link, a logistics company focused on the North American market, said clients are calculating their next steps, though exporters of car parts and other hardware have not yet called off shipments to the U.S. and Canada.

“No one knows how the tariffs will change,” Li said.

Even exporters who don’t produce in China are suffering due to the trade war. Danny Elassir, export director for Exotica, a company that makes air fresheners in Ohio, said his business is being affected due to other countries imposing tariffs on U.S. goods.

Elassir said his company has been present at the Canton Fair, in the southern Guangdong province, for more than a decade because it is where it has connected with most of its clients from the Middle East and Latin America.

“Going back to the old duty rates — this is really the only way we see it happening for business to keep growing,” he said.

___

Mistreanu reported from Taipei, Taiwan. Associated Press video producer Olivia Zhang contributed to this report.