PALM BEACH: US President Donald Trump said Vietnam’s top leader told him in a “very productive” call Friday that he wanted to make a deal on tariffs, after the southeast Asian nation was hit by huge levies.
A manufacturing powerhouse that counted the US as its biggest market last year, Vietnam was hammered with a thumping 46% tariff in Trump’s global trade blitz.
“Just had a very productive call with To Lam, general secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam, who told me that Vietnam wants to cut their tariffs down to ZERO if they are able to make an agreement with the US,” Trump said on Truth Social.
“I thanked him on behalf of our country, and said I look forward to a meeting in the near future.”
Trump’s apparent willingness to engage in talks with Vietnam highlighted wider uncertainty over his tariff policy, after officials had insisted that the levies were non-negotiable.
Vietnam took advantage of its location and cheap skilled labour to position itself as an alternative manufacturing hub to China during a trade war between Beijing and Washington in Trump’s first term.
Many companies shifted parts of their supply chain, and Vietnam’s trade surplus with the US doubled between 2017 and 2023.
But now big brands such as Nike – which produced 50% of its footwear and 28% of its apparel in Vietnam in the 2024 financial year – face vastly higher costs, which they will have to absorb or pass on to customers.
Japanese gaming giant Nintendo has also switched an increasing share of its production to Vietnam and Cambodia in recent years.
Nintendo said on Friday it was delaying preorders of its hotly anticipated Switch 2 gaming console, which is being launched on June 5, as it assesses the fallout from the Trump tariffs.
