India had notified the World Trade Organization on June 14 of its decision to increase tariffs on more than two dozen goods from the United States. It is a $241 million measure that matches the amount of steel and aluminum import duty expected to be collected from India by the United States through the tariffs imposed by the Trump administration earlier this year. More than a third of the figure comes from almonds; India is the world’s biggest buyer of U.S.-grown almonds.

India finalized its decision during a week when the global trade war escalated, with the United States enacting $50 billion in tariffs on Chinese goods and the European Union imposing $3 billion in levies on such products as U.S.-made bourbon, peanut butter and Harley-Davidson motorcycles. Trump has erroneously called out India for its “100 percent” tariffs on Harleys; in fact India lowered its tariffs on high-end motorcycles from a range of 60 to 75 percent to 50 percent. The new tariffs will go into effect Aug. 4.

Economists noted that the amount of money involved with India’s levies dwarfed in comparison with that of China — U.S.-India trade was $114 billion in 2016, while U.S.-China trade was $648.5 billion — but that the gesture had important symbolism and could presage further strain between the two friendly democracies at a time when their diplomats are working to deepen military ties.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/india-imposes-retaliatory-tariffs-on-us-as-global-trade-war-widens/2018/06/21/7c3a016b-1de0-497a-9635-a522bc55810a_story.html