US President Donald Trump on Tuesday called China “economically hostile” for not buying American soybeans and threatened to halt imports of cooking oil and other products from the country in retaliation.
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“I believe that China purposefully not buying our soybeans and causing difficulty for our Soybean Farmers, is an Economically Hostile Act,” Trump posted on social media, the latest in a series of escalating moves since he threatened on Friday to slap an additional 100 per cent tariff on all imports from China.
“We are considering terminating business with China having to do with Cooking Oil, and other elements of Trade, as retribution,” he said. “As an example, we can easily produce Cooking Oil ourselves; we don’t need to purchase it from China.”
Along with animal feed, cooking oil is one of the main products that soybeans yield. While the US imports most of its cooking oil from Canada in the form of canola, China is a large supplier to the US of used cooking oil (UCO) that is used in biofuels like ethanol.
China’s Ministry of Commerce took many by surprise when it announced expansive export controls imposed on rare earth elements, essential raw materials in the manufacture of hi-tech products, prompting Trump to retaliate.
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Earlier on Tuesday, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in a CNBC interview that these new controls have derailed efforts by the two sides to settle trade differences. This has prompted Trump to hit imports from China with tariffs across the board, along with products from a wide array of other countries.