Canada will retaliate against the new US tariffs, imposing customs duties on steel, electronic equipment and dairy products purchased from the United States of America as of September 8, said Prime Minister Mark Carney today.
© Renaud Philippe/Bloomberg via Getty Images
22/08/2026
by
Lusa
O head of the Canadian government said that the country cannot accept the proposal for a trade agreement presented by Donald Trump's US administration and avoid tariffs, ensuring that it will not yield and announce retaliation measures.
In the first press appearance since the failure of trade negotiations with the United States in Otava, Carney said that Canadian tariffs will target products in sectors of activity such as steel, dairy, home appliances and electronics, equating to the 50% customs charges that Washington began to impose today on about $24,000 million Canadian exports.
Carney said that although the country “can’t control the storm blowing from Washington”, it can “make a new path” through the “diversification” of its trade relations.
The Canadian Prime Minister said he warned Trump of Canada's crucial importance as an energy supplier to the United States.
“Canada boosts US growth by providing 99% of natural gas imports, 85% of electricity imports and 60% of crude oil imports,” he said.
The two countries faced the risk of a trade war, after decades in which Canada built had wide access to the US market.
Carney anticipated this change in the relationship between the two countries at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January when he said that the world was going through “a breakdown, not a transition”. At the time, it advocated the need for countries to strengthen their economies internally to reduce risks to economic coercion.