UK unveils new trade strategy

The United Kingdom government unveiled a new trade strategy on Thursday that shifts the focus away from pursuing major international deals to strengthening services exports and trade defenses.

The policy overhaul comes as ministers acknowledge the country has concentrated too heavily on securing comprehensive trade agreements since leaving the European Union, while failing to adequately protect domestic industries.

In a news release, the Department for Business and Trade said that amid growing global trade tensions and tariff disputes, including with the United States, the government plans to make its trade protection measures more "agile, assertive, and accountable", to shield British businesses from global turbulence.

The new approach marks a shift away from pursuing trade agreements with major economies including the US and India, once touted as Brexit benefits, toward securing targeted deals that benefit the UK's services sector while maintaining flexibility on industrial protections such as steel tariffs.

The UK is aiming to remove US tariffs on steel imports under their agreement, though implementation details are yet to be finalized.

The government said it plans to strengthen protections for the UK's steel industry beyond June 2026, when current safeguards expire, by working with producers and unions to prevent imports from undercutting UK businesses.

Business and Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said: "The UK is an open trading nation but we must reconcile this with a new geopolitical reality and work in our own national interest.

"Our trade strategy will sharpen our trade defense, so we can ensure British businesses are protected from harm.

"Broad and complex trade deals like we secured with India will bring billions to our economy every year but to deliver (our plan), we will strike more agile, targeted deals that exploit the sectors which drive the most growth for our economy."

The UK's new trade strategy will prioritize removing regulatory barriers to boost the country's 500-billion-pound ($687-billion) services sector exports, said Douglas Alexander, a trade minister.

"In a time of tariffs, global services trade is booming," he told the Financial Times newspaper. "This trade strategy recognizes it as an indispensable element of the UK's contemporary export earnings.

"Our strategic response to this new world can't be based on nostalgia or post-imperial delusion, let alone any ideological or dogmatic attachment to one trading bloc or another."

He said this new "hard-headed, data driven, and agile approach" to trade policy would be guided by "pragmatic patriotism".

"In this changed and challenging world, we will promote what we can and protect what we must to advance the UK's national interest," he said.

The new strategy aims to tackle the UK's poor post-Brexit trade performance, where a significant drop in goods exports has been only partially balanced by services growth, said FT analysis.

According to the Centre for European Reform's recent report, UK trade volumes have grown just 1 percent in real terms since 2019. This significantly lags behind the EU, where trade has grown by around 8 percent, and G7 nations collectively, which have seen similar gains to those of the EU.

jonathan@mail.chinadailyuk.com