Japan's tariff negotiator Ryosei Akazawa embarked for the United States on Thursday for the seventh time to negotiate tariffs that are hurting Japan's economy.
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and US President Donald Trump agreed to push ahead with trade talks when they met in Canada in mid-June, but failed to agree to a tariff deal.
"Tariffs have been imposed on autos, auto parts, steel and aluminium, and some of them have doubled to 50 percent along with 10 percent general tariff. These are causing daily losses to Japan's economy," Akazawa said last month.
Japan also faces a 24 percent tariff rate starting in July unless it can negotiate a deal with Washington.
In a bid to reach an agreement with the US, Japan is also proposing a mechanism to reduce the auto tariff rate based on how much countries contribute to the US auto industry.
Big Progress!
On his first visit to the US on April 16, after being appointed the chief tariff negotiator, Akazawa met US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, but unexpectedly, President Trump inserted himself in the meeting directly.
“Hopefully something can be worked out which is good (GREAT!) for Japan and the USA!” Trump wrote in a social media post ahead of the meeting.
Afterwards, he posted: “A great honour to have just met with the Japanese delegation on trade. Big Progress!”
Japanese Prime Minister Ishiba said that Akazawa told him from Washington that the talks were “very candid and constructive”.
Corn and Soybeans
On his second visit on April 30, Akazawa offered to buy more US corn and soybeans or continue discussions on developing liquefied natural gas (LNG) fields in Alaska, but no concrete agreement was reached.
The Japanese public has little faith in the negotiations; a poll by the Yomiuri Shimbun after two rounds of negotiations showed that only 19 percent of people had any expectations for the talks, the Japan Times reported.
Japan's negotiator, however, was optimistic and said US defence equipment purchases, shipbuilding technology collaboration, a revision of automobile import standards and an increase in agricultural imports could be bargaining chips in tariff talks.
In the third round of talks on May 23, Japan reiterated its opposition to the tariffs, proposing cooperation in shipbuilding and lighter certification for US vehicles; however, the talks remained unproductive.
Bargaining chips
Just after a week, Akazawa landed in Washington again for a fourth round of negotiations. Japan came up with another bargaining chip. They mulled the purchase of US defence equipment as a bargaining chip in tariff talks.
The result was that the two sides agreed to meet again before the Group of Seven summit in mid-June.
After the fifth round of talks on June 5, Akazawa again parroted the obvious: that progress had been made and a trade agreement would be reached soon.
However, he added, "We've not been able to find a point of agreement yet."
The sixth visit on June 16 occurred shortly after a meeting between Ishiba and Trump at the G7 summit in Canada.
