U.S. escalating trade war damages world economy: Japanese experts and media

There is no winner in the trade war between China and the U.S., and U.S. escalation of the trade war will bring damage to not only both sides but also Japan and the whole world economy, according to Japanese media and experts.

Kiyoyuki Seguchi, Research Director at the Canon Institute for Global Studies, believes that any party of the two largest economies in the world will be revenged if it takes stern economic sanctions against the other, which not only hurts both sides but also will result in long-term recession of the world economy. At present, U.S. adding tariffs to Chinese products hurts the U.S. itself as well as the whole world.

The escalation of China-U.S. trade friction has caused increasing worries about the slowing down of global economic growth and the difficult situation of policy operation.

U.S. adding tariffs on Chinese products has also greatly annoyed Japanese companies. Japanese media reported that consumer goods that Japanese companies are good at producing, including game machines, watches and sneakers， are on the latest list of tariffs. Japanese enterprises’ total export from its production bases in China to the U.S. is about 1 trillion yen every year. If the U.S. adds tariffs on the goods， which will be transferred to their price, it will bring burden to consumers and affect sales volume.

Japanese media generally believe that as the U.S. adds tariffs and escalates the China-U.S. trade friction, global economic and trade slowdown is becoming increasingly obvious.

There is no winner in trade wars. U.S. adding tariffs and escalating trade friction harm interests of China as well as enterprises and consumers in the U.S. and the rest of the world. Therefore, the U.S. has to correct its actions inj order to reduce damage to consumers and related companies.

Contributed by Zhang Guannan, Guangming Daily reporter

Translated by Zhang Zhou