Trump tariffs could cost Italian wine €1 billion, UIV reports

President Donald Trump's threatened 25% tariffs on imports of European Union products into the US could leave the Italian wine sector around €1 billion out of pocket this year, according to a new report from the Unione Italiana Vini (UIV). Although Trump has his acolytes in Italy, including Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Infrastructure and Transport and far-right populist Matteo Salvini, the return of 'The Donald' to the Oval Office is not necessarily welcomed by those working in Italian wine. It was feared that a second Trump term would usher in a new wave of punitive tariffs on products from the European Union. With relations between Europe and the US seemingly on a knife edge, Trump has described the EU as a bloc designed to "screw the United States" as he prepares to announce tariffs. "It'll be 25% generally speaking and that will be on cars and all other things," the President said last week. According to the UIV data, the 25% tariffs would cause a direct year-on-year loss of around €472 million for Italian wine exports to the US. This would then rise to around a €1bn loss as a result of economic slowdown in other markets caused by the tariffs. In Canada, they could dip by 6% year-on-year come the end of 2025, and in EU markets (outside of Italy) there could be a 5% contraction, equal to a loss of around €216m. In Italy itself, a 5% drop, equal to around €350m, is also projected. The US is a major export market for Italian wine, valued at around €1.9bn annually and buying up almost a quarter (24%) of all Italian wine exports. For several Italian wines, including Brunello di Montalcino and Prosecco, the US is the biggest international market by quite some distance. In the case of the latter, US importers have been stockpiling bottles of Prosecco ahead of the arrival of tariffs.

UIV response

Speaking with the drinks business shortly after Trump's re-election, UIV president Lamberto Frescobaldi noted that tariffs go against the US President's own economic targets for his time in office: "If you have sanctions, it naturally brings inflation to his country – one of the things which cost the Democrats the election was inflation, and one of Trump’s goals is to lower inflation." In light of this latest update on the situation, the UIV issued a statement from Frescobaldi where he called on Italian producers to team up with US importers and distributors "to try to amortise the surplus of costs resulting from the trade war". "We realise that this sacrifice would not be easy to implement and would lead to uneconomic dynamics in the short term, but the imperative is to save the market and the special relationship that binds us with US consumers," he continued, before warning that it could be even worse than the initial figures suggest. "The hypothesis of duties at 25% would in fact lead to an almost total exit from the market, which would be worse than the figures listed above."