Medellín, Colombia – Ecuador has announced it will raise tariffs on goods imported from Colombia this Thursday in an escalation of the ongoing trade dispute between the two neighbours.
The new levy will take effect on March 1, escalating the spat which began in January and has seen reciprocal tariffs of 30% as well as punitive measures on specific goods such as energy.
The Ecuadorian government, under hard-right President Daniel Noboa, first imposed tariffs on Colombia citing Bogotá’s failure to tackle organized crime on their shared border.
The Noboa administration has justified the latest tariff hike as a response to continued insecurity.
“After confirming Colombia’s failure to implement concrete and effective measures in the area of border security, Ecuador finds itself obliged to take sovereign action,” read a statement by the country’s Ministry of Production, Foreign Trade, and Investment on Thursday.
This is the latest development in tensions between the two countries which has seen tit-for-tat tariffs since January.
A day after Noboa imposed a 30% levy on Colombian imports, Bogotá responded with an equal tariff on items ranging from food, agricultural products and industrial goods, as well as a suspension of electricity sales.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro also defended his country’s efforts to tackle crime, citing the seizure of more than 200 tonnes of cocaine on the border and his country’s “close” relationship with the Ecuadorian security forces.
After Bogotá suspended electricity exports to Ecuador, Noboa raised the fee of transporting Colombian crude oil through Ecuador’s pipeline network by 900%.
Business federations in both countries have largely reacted negatively to the trade dispute, while transport workers protested the tariffs on the border earlier this month.
The Ecuadorian Federation of Exporters (Fedexpor) called on Noboa this Tuesday to reopen dialogue with Colombia to resolve the trade dispute. Ecuador’s weekly exports to its neighbor are valued at USD$5.25 million.
Javier Díaz Molina, president of Colombia’s National Foreign Trade Association (Analdez Coombia), said this Thursday that the new 50% tariff rate will make trade between the two countries “unfeasible”. He added that the tariffs will harm legal, formal trade between the neighbors, meaning that “the only ones benefiting from these actions are those involved in illegal activities.”
Since his 2023 election, Noboa has aligned himself with White House policy, making his hardline approach to crime a key priority of his government. The shared border between the two nations runs 600km from the Pacific to the Amazon and has been a hotspot for organized crime, drug trafficking and illegal mining.
Feature image: Colombia-Ecuador border photographed in 2020.
Image credit: Burkhard Mücke via Wikimedia Commons
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