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NICOLE MEILAK nmeilak@mediatoday.com.mt 10 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 16 MARCH 2025 NEWS Trade, tariffs, and turmoil: Trump's second Economist Marisa Xuereb and Ruben Cuschieri from the Chamber of Commerce warn that Trump's trade war is disrupting supply chains, squeezing businesses, and pushing Europe toward self-reliance YOU could be managing a country, a company, or your own household – one of the biggest challenges in leader- ship positions is making deci- sions when you're uncertain of what is to come. Parents panic if they don't know how many people they need to cook for. Managers would think twice before tak- ing on a new project if they're hearing rumours about compa- ny layoffs. Prime ministers hes- itate to implement sweeping reforms if the economic out- look is unstable or if geopolit- ical tensions are on the rise. In any leadership role, uncertain- ty breeds hesitation. Politics has become all the more uncertain. It has been five years since COVID-19 forced countries into lockdowns and three years since war broke out on Europe's border. Energy prices soared; general inflation skyrocketed. Now, the United States has a new but familiar president, Donald Trump, who is fresh into his second term at the White House, and he's waging an economic war of his own. Trump has been in office for just over 50 days, but he's come back swinging for his second term as president. In his home country, he set up the Depart- ment of Government Efficiency (DOGE), renamed the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, and banned transgender wom- en from competing in women's sports teams. Abroad, his actions have been equally erratic. He halted all aid to Ukraine, only to reinstate it after the war-torn country agreed, in principle, to a 30- day ceasefire. His government slapped tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada but then granted a one-month tariff ex- emption on goods that trade under the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement. Now, his target is also set on the European Union (EU). Last month, Trump made it clear that he plans to impose tar- iffs on goods made in the EU. When he imposed tariffs on all aluminium and steel imports, the EU decided it would retali- ate in two phases: first by reim- posing tariffs that were already in place during Trump's first term, and secondly by adding more levies on top of this, to the tune of around €18 billion. The EU is fighting the trade war, and companies are feeling the effects. MaltaToday spoke with two leaders in the busi- ness community, both familiar with manufacturing and supply chain logistics, to understand how companies are coping in these uncertain times. Disrupting the status quo Few people understand busi- ness operations the way Mari- sa Xuereb does. An economist by profession, she has held di- rectorships at some of Malta's biggest companies. She spent 10 years on the council of the Malta Chamber of Commerce and served as its president be- tween 2021 and 2023. To Xuereb, it's clear that Trump is in a race to grab as much of the global supply of critical minerals as he can. Ultimately, his war is against China. According to the Inter- national Energy Agency, Chi- na is the largest copper refin- ing country, with around 40% of the market share. When it comes to refining operations, China's share is around 35% for nickel, 50-70% for lithium and cobalt, and nearly 90% for rare earth elements. "These minerals are the new oil because they are key to both the green and the digital tran- sition," she said. "This is why Trump is holding back on the green transition: At this point, China stands to benefit most from it. A typical electric vehi- cle requires six times the min- eral inputs of a conventional car, and an onshore wind plant requires nine times more min- eral resources than a gas-fired plant. The concern regarding critical minerals was already there during his first term eight years ago, but it has now be- come an obsession that drives everything else he is doing on the global scene, including the imposition of trade tariffs on neighbouring Canada and his manoeuvring on the war in Ukraine, both mineral-rich ter- ritories." What is worrying boardrooms everywhere, according to Xuer- eb, is that Trump will do what- ever he feels is necessary to grab critical minerals. This be- came clear when Trump him- self acknowledged that trade tariffs would hurt Americans in the immediate term and did not exclude a recession. "Trump is clearly challenging the status quo in the most dis- ruptive of ways. The end justi- fies the means," she said. The real victims of the trade war Ruben Cuschieri, managing director of R3Vox Ltd, has a clear view of how these tariffs will affect European and Amer- ican companies—not only be- cause of the company's manu- facturing experience, but also because it is the sister compa- ny to R2Sonic, an American company founded in 2005. He is also a member of the Malta Chamber of Commerce, occu- pying the role of chairperson in the chamber's manufacturing economic group. "As with any other war, the victims of trade wars are not the ones starting them or insti- gating them, but other parties who have less say in the mat- ter," he said. "This volatile sit- uation has left many businesses and investors guessing at how these tariffs and retaliatory ones will impact their compet- itiveness, their customer base, and their supply chain." The situation was uncertain enough before Trump became the US president, Cuschie- ri said, with wars in Ukraine