President Donald Trump’s massive new tariffs would send the US tariff rate dramatically higher to levels unseen since around 1910 and may drive many nations into recession, top ratings agency, Fitch Ratings has predicted.
Trump’s very aggressive tariff moves are set to lift the US tariff rate from just 2.5% last year to 22%, according to Fitch.
That surpasses the roughly 20% tariff rate the United States charged following the infamous Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, which set off a global trade war that economists say worsened the Great Depression.
“This is a game changer, not only for the US economy but for the global economy,” Olu Sonola, head of US economic research at Fitch Ratings, wrote in a statement on Wednesday, April 2, 2025.
Sonola said “many” nations will likely plunge into recession.
“You can throw most forecasts out the door if this tariff rate stays on for an extended period of time,” the Fitch economist said.
Earlier on Wednesday, April 2, 2025, Trump announced that exports from Nigeria to the US will attract a 14% tariff compared to the 27% that the US government claims it receives from Nigeria.
This is even as the US President slammed a baseline 10% tariff on all U.S. imports, alongside sharper, country-specific reciprocal tariffs aimed at nations that impose steeper duties on American goods.
The new tariffs, which take immediate effect, apply to more than 50 countries. They include major trade partners like China, the European Union, India, and Japan, as well as developing economies in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). Nigeria’s trade with the United States hit a combined N31.1 trillion between 2015 and 2024 while total imports within this period were N16.4 trillion or 8.7% of Nigeria’s global imports.
The announcement, made during a Rose Garden event tagged “Liberation Day,” marks a dramatic shift from decades of free-trade orthodoxy that has underpinned the global economy since World War II.
Trump declared the start of what he called a new era of “fair trade,” promising to “supercharge America’s industrial base” and force open foreign markets long accused of shutting out U.S. goods.
“This is one of the most important days in American history,” Trump said. “We will supercharge our domestic industrial base; we will pry open foreign markets and break down foreign trade barriers.”
By: Babajide Okeowo
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