The U.S. Department of Commerce has issued a 107% import tariff on Italian pasta, after an anti-dumping investigation. Italian producers have announced legal actions, as Commerce has based its decision not on evidence but on lack of evidence, i.e., it has accused Italian producers La Molisana and Garofalo of being non-cooperative. However, the tariff has been extended to all Italian pasta producers.
Italian economist Michele Geraci commented on X that when he was an official of the Conte 1 government, he managed to have the Trump administration lift tariffs for Italian agri-food products, and this, despite the fact that the government had joined the Belt and Road Initiative which Washington did not see well. Now, Italian Prime Minister Meloni’s serf-like attitude towards the Trump administration “is reciprocated with a +100% tariff on pasta.”
(This author considers such tariffs as an assault on the American people, depriving them of a unique source of quality food.)
