Gov’t not expecting to be on US direct tariffs ‘hit list’

However, it said Singapore will be impacted indirectly if there is any friction.

The Singaporean government said that tariffs and emerging tariffs are a reality in the future but does not anticipate being on the United States (US) direct tariffs hit list.

Answering parliamentary questions on Singapore-US relations, Minister for Foreign Affairs Vivian Balakrishnan said that in 2019, then-Prime Minister Lee and President Donald Trump signed the Protocol of Amendment to the 1990 Memorandum of Understanding regarding United States use of facilities in Singapore (1990 MoU).

This extended the MoU by 15 years and underscored Singapore's strong bilateral defence relationship and support for the US strategic presence in the region.

“However, as trade constitutes more than three times our gross domestic products, we will be impacted indirectly if there is any friction,” Balakrishnan said.

The minister called for members of the House to recognise that the government still needs to keep calm and be careful in talking and behaving.

“But I need to prepare Singaporeans for a turbulent ride in the months or years to come,” Balakrishnan added.

Reaching the people who run Asia's businesses is harder than it used to be.

Inboxes are crowded. Attention is short. The executives you most want to reach — the founders, CFOs, and operators who actually move budgets — are the hardest to find through the usual channels. If you're building a company, a category, or a reputation, you already know this.

We've spent twenty years building the room they read. Singapore Business Review is where senior decision makers in Singapore and across Southeast Asia come for business coverage they can't get elsewhere — in print, online, and in person at the summits and roundtables we host across seven markets.

If you have something these readers should know about — a point of view worth publishing, a product worth their attention, an event worth their time — we'd like to hear what you're trying to do.

Book a meeting

| Or download the media kit (PDF)

240,000 senior readers quarterly in print Top 1,700 Singapore companies reached

7 markets across Southeast Asia