Australian farmers are coming to terms with the Trump Administration’s Wednesday 2 April tariffs on Australian goods, following a 25 per cent tariff on Aussie steel and aluminium entering the USA.

As the US applies global tariffs on goods entering the USA, US trade officials appear to forget that the USA has a trade surplus with Australia. Australia’s exports to the US stand at $16.7 billion US dollars, but the US sends more than double that our way - $34.6bn USD.

In 2018 when the US imposed 25 per cent steel and 10 per cent aluminium tariffs, the former Australian Coalition Government understood Trump’s transactional gamesmanship, securing exemptions on aluminium and steel tariffs within 12 months. Our ‘deal’ was two months earlier than Mexico or Canada’s exemptions, who were slower to realise that Mr Trump is all about ‘The Art of the Deal’ - the title of his 1987 book.

It is a point in our history where we must ask ourselves, who do we trust to deal with President Trump?  Australians resoundingly back Peter Dutton, Leader of the Liberal-Nationals Coalition, to look after our farmers and exporters. Mr Albanese has not stood up for our country, has shown no backbone and has not spoken with the US President for 6 weeks.

Victoria’s $1.8 billion annual agricultural exports to the USA are second only to Queensland ($1.9bn).  Australia’s major farming exports to the US are beef and veal ($3.3bn AUD), sheep meat ($1.2bn) and wine ($390 million).  Victoria’s niche exports to the USA include infant formula ($22.5m), cheese curd ($16.3m) and spirits ($13.3m).  

The winegrape industry continues to deal with grape oversupply (crushing less than the long-term trend in recent harvests) and is returning to the Chinese market. Our wine exports to China jumped from $7.3m to $611.5m in one year as China’s Australian wine ban lifted (our Australia-China wine trend to 2020 had been about $1 billion).

The Nationals stand with our farmers and hold the trade portfolio, so I am far more confident a Dutton-Littleproud government can secure better deals for our farmers