On November 14th, the White House issued an executive order signed by Trump, deciding to exempt some agricultural products from "equivalent tariffs" starting from November 13th, 2025 Eastern Time, with tea being one of them. It should be noted that the exemption this time is for the additional tax portion, which is not equivalent to the basic import tariff.
According to the August US international trade data released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis of the US Department of Commerce on November 19, 2025 Eastern Time, the total value of US goods imports and exports in that month fell for the first time year-on-year (the total import and export value was $450.2 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 3.3% and a month on month decrease of 5.4%); Among them, the import scale of agricultural products ranks first (accounting for 6.9% of the total imports in the United States), with a total amount of 18.57 billion US dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 6.5%; Imported agricultural products from China amounted to 4.04 billion US dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 18.7%.
As a traditional export market for Chinese tea, the United States will import 33% (by country of origin) and 25% (by country of origin) of green tea and organic tea from China in 2024. According to the latest customs data statistics, from January to October 2025, China exported 8762 tons of tea to the United States, a year-on-year decrease of 5.6%; The export value was 53.16 million US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 9%; Among them, there were 4236 tons of green tea, 648 tons of jasmine tea, and 385 tons of oolong tea, with year-on-year growth of 6.3%, 7%, and 26.4%, respectively; 3378 tons of black tea, a year-on-year decrease of 20.9%.
The exemption of "equivalent tariffs" on tea by the United States this time will effectively reduce the export cost of Chinese tea to the United States in the short term and stimulate market vitality. To alleviate the long-term impact of related chain reactions on industry development, it is recommended that export tea companies:
1. Continuously control the red line of tea quality and safety, actively respond to potential technical trade barriers, and enhance risk resistance capabilities;
2. Fully utilize trade preferential policies such as RCEP, set up processing plants or overseas warehouses in tariff friendly areas, and optimize the supply chain;
3. Pay attention to brand building, transform towards high value-added and deep processing fields (such as tea extracts and functional tea drinks), and enhance international bargaining power.
