News / Forwarders unfazed as EU lawmakers block ratification of US trade deal

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Forwarders have responded indifferently to European lawmakers blocking ratification of the EU-US trade deal agreed last year, with logistics operators claiming that this latest move is “just one of many” points of uncertainty they find themselves contending with.

Chair of the European Parliament’s trade committee Bernd Lange confirmed on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos today that lawmakers had paused implementation of the EU-US deal, known as the “Turnberry Deal,” until further notice.

Mr Lange said: “Our negotiating team decided to suspend work on the legal implementation of Turnberry deal. Our sovereignty and territorial integrity are at stake. Business as usual impossible,” in reference to President Trump’s threats to acquire Greenland by coercion.

Reached in July at Trump’s Turnberry golf course in Scotland, the eponymous deal led to a reduction in tensions between Brussels and Washington, with the former agreeing to up US investments in exchange for a tariff reduction on European goods from 30% to 15%.

In his determination to “acquire Greenland,” the president appeared to throw that reduction into doubt, threatening to hit countries resisting it with a new 10% tariff rate, rising to 25% in June – although the threat remains a social media post, with no executive order yet issued.

Asked what this latest development in the psychodrama engulfing geopolitics at the moment, forwarders appeared relatively unphased, seeing it as more noise amidst an increasingly chaotic operating environment.

One forwarder told The Loadstar off the record: “Our rather unofficial opinion on the EU suspension is that it is only one point of many causing uncertainty. The whole ongoing changing topic with the duties and tariffs only makes the forwarding sector seek stability.”

While the deal in its totality still required approval from the European Parliament to take full effect, the July agreement saw certain elements come into play early – including the reduction from 30% to 15% on tariffs – leaving question marks over where those aspects stand.