04/03/2025April 3, 2025
Trump tariffs cause bemusement and amusement on Australia’s outpost islands
Officials and locals in have been left somewhat baffled by the inclusion of small, remote Australian islands in the list of regions hit by
Locals on the Heard and McDonald Islands in the Antarctic, located some 4,100 kilometers (2,200 nautical miles) from the Australian mainland, were unable to comment on the imposition of the 10% tariffs, as they consist largely of seabirds, seals and penguins.
However, officials and residents on the South Pacific outpost of Norfolk Island, whose economy is based mostly on tourism, expressed some surprise at the 29% tariff imposed on its exports to the US.
“Products from Norfolk Island are going to have a 29% tariff? Well, there is no product, so it’s not going to have an effect,” Gye Duncan, who owns a tax consultancy on the island, told the Reuters news agency.
Miles Howe, a former Norfolk Island Chamber of Commerce president, who lives on the island, said he did not think the tariffs worried local residents.
“I think everyone’s rather amused by the idea that we’d even register on the radar of somebody like Donald Trump,” he said.
According to US government data cited by Reuters news agency, the US has had trade deficits with Norfolk Island for the past three years. The data says that Norfolk island exported $300,000 (€272,100) worth of goods to the US in 2022, $700,000 in 2023 and $200,000 in 2024. Its imports from the US were worth $100,000 in those years.
Norfolk Island’s imports from the US peaked at $11.7 million in 2020, with no exports recorded. The data did not say what goods were traded.
Norfolk Island, located around 1,400 km from the Australian mainland, served as a British penal colony in the late 18th and early 19th century before being settled from 1856 onward, initially by descendants of the Bounty mutineers from Pitcairn Island. It was handed to Australia as an external territory in 1914.
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