1 August 2025
Mineral and Petroleum Resources Minister Gwede Mantashe says South Africa will seek new markets if the United States imposes high tariffs, particularly in relation to critical minerals.
South Africa is bracing for economic shock as a 30% tariff on all its exports to the United States is set to take effect on Friday, August 1, unless a last-minute trade deal is reached.
This comes after US President Donald Trump announced last month that the tariffs were being imposed to address what he called long-standing trade imbalances and unfair market restrictions.
Speaking on the sidelines of the G20 Critical Minerals Engagement, Mantashe stressed that the country would not allow itself to be bullied over its own natural resources and insisted that trade must happen on mutually beneficial terms.
100,000 jobs at risk
More than 70% of arable land is still in the hands of the white minority decades after the end of apartheid, according to the latest figures from 2017, and it is these farmers who will be among the hardest hit by Trump’s new tariffs.
Many among them are Afrikaners, descendants of the first white settlers who Trump has falsely claimed are persecuted by government policies and targeted killings, leading him to take in around 50 as refugees in May.
“It’s not a racial divide as he is trying to make it look and sound like,” Ferreira told AFP.
“He says the government is not looking after the farmers and yet he is penalising the farmers by putting up tariffs of 30% on agricultural products… It’s ridiculous,” he said.
The hiked tariffs could cost South Africa 100,000 jobs, according to the head of the central bank, Lesetja Kganyago.
The continent’s most industrialised economy is already struggling with an unemployment rate of nearly 33%.
“The impact in agriculture could be quite devastating because agriculture employs a lot of low-skilled workers, and here the impact is on citrus fruit, table grapes and wines,” Kganyago said on 702 Radio.
Between 6 to 8% of South Africa’s citrus production is sent to the United States.
For farmers in Citrusdal, 200 kilometres north of Cape Town, this is an essential market and also tariff-free under the preferential African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA).
“At the moment it’s about 25 to 30% of our business,” said Gerrit van der Merwe among rows of oranges on his 1,000-hectare (nearly 2,500-acre) plot.
Source IOL
