Tariffs between the United States and Brazil have been the subject of questioning between the governments of both nations.

An initial fact to ponder: The United States has a surplus in its trade in goods with Brazil. In 2024, its exports were for 49,667 million dollars and its imports totaled 44,183 million dollars, according to data from the Department of Commerce.

Tariffs between the United States and Brazil

US President Donald Trump announced that the 25% tariff on iron, steel and aluminum will be reciprocal. As he explained, Brazil currently applies an 18% tariff on U.S. ethanol imports.

However, the Minister of Mines and Energy, Alexandre Silveira, rejected this statement. He also pointed out that the United States maintains a tariff of 81.16% on Brazilian sugar, a factor that, according to him, cannot be overlooked.

U.S. exports of bioethanol to the Brazilian market peaked at $761 million in 2018. But then they declined sharply.

Overall, Brazil’s ethanol imports, mostly from the United States (80 percent or more between 2017 and 2020), declined progressively between 2019 and 2022, when Brazil ended its tariff-free ethanol import quota in February 2023 (currently the import tariff is 18 percent). In 2024, Brazilian exports of this product were US$ 217 million.

The trend of US imports of bioethanol from Brazil, in millions of dollars, is shown below:

• 2021: 146.
• 2022: 163.
• 2023: 1.
• 2024: 53.

Sugar exports 

During his first term, President Trump had applied similar import tariffs on steel and aluminum, but granted exemption quotas for trading partners, including Brazil. On February 12, 2025, Brazil’s Vice President and Minister of Development, Industry, Trade and Services, Geraldo Alckmin, stated that he expected to negotiate exemption quotas for steel and aluminum shipped to the United States, which would allow Brazil to export a certain amount of these products without paying the full tariff.

These are Brazilian exports of cane or beet sugar and chemically pure sucrose, in solid form, to the U.S. market, in millions of dollars:

• 2021: 261.
• 2022: 195.
• 2023: 543.
• 2024: 769.

On February 14, 2025, during a radio interview, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva stated that Brazil planned to apply the principle of reciprocity in the event of a tariff increase, either by increasing import tariffs for U.S. products or by informing the World Trade Organization.