{"id":30322,"date":"2025-08-29T07:49:19","date_gmt":"2025-08-29T07:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/30322\/"},"modified":"2025-08-29T07:49:19","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T07:49:19","slug":"in-a-nightmare-india-braces-for-big-layoffs-as-trumps-tariffs-bite-business-and-economy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/30322\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018In a nightmare\u2019: India braces for big layoffs as Trump\u2019s tariffs bite | Business and Economy"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Delhi, India \u2013 <\/strong> In a sprawling market in the Indian capital, Anuj Gupta sits in a corner of his shop as silence hangs over it.<\/p>\n

Gupta sources and exports garment accessories \u2013 like laces and buttons \u2013 to major global brands. But punishing tariffs imposed by United States President Donald Trump have brought Gupta\u2019s business to its knees.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday morning, India woke up to 50 percent tariffs imposed on its goods sold to the US, after the Trump administration followed through on its threat of doubling levies from 25 percent over India\u2019s purchase of Russian oil. The White House says Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s government, among the top buyers of crude from Russia, is financing Moscow\u2019s war in Ukraine. Indian officials have accused Washington of double standards, pointing towards how the European Union and China buy more from Russia and how Washington, too, still trades with Moscow.<\/p>\n

In the fashion world, the cycle runs a year ahead, explains Gupta \u2013 clothes are being designed and made for autumn 2026 at the moment. So, the hovering uncertainty in the market has \u201champered the work badly\u201d, leaving a \u201cbig dent\u201d, he said. Up to 40 percent of his business is in the US market.<\/p>\n

Gupta said until Wednesday morning, he was still hoping against hope. \u201cMaybe Trump is just bullying us for optics, or maybe Modi\u2019s good relations with the US will rescue the situation,\u201d he thought. \u201cBut we were the worst dealt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Five rounds of talks have failed to yield a trade deal between Washington and New Delhi, and Gupta said exporters now fear their customers might give up on India altogether.\u00a0\u201cIf these tensions prolong, then buyers would look for alternative markets for sourcing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

As New Delhi grapples with Trump\u2019s moves that walk the US back from two decades of diplomatic and strategic investments in India, analysts and economic observers say the tariffs could devastate key export-driven sectors of the Indian economy, with hundreds of thousands of jobs at risk.<\/p>\n

\"tariff\"A worker takes measurements of dresses at a garment manufacturing unit in Noida, India, August 7, 2025 [Adnan Abidi\/TPX Images of the Day\/Reuters]\u2018It\u2019s so helpless\u2019<\/p>\n

Ajay Sahai, the CEO of the Federation of Indian Export Organisation (FIEO), the largest government-backed body of Indian exporters, was cautiously hopeful of help from the Modi administration after meeting the country\u2019s finance minister,\u00a0Nirmala Sitharaman, on Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government has fully assured us that they will provide all kinds of support needed to navigate this problem, perhaps including an economic package,\u201d Sahai told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government has asked us to prepare a report, and then they will come up with a scheme,\u201d he said. \u201c[Sitharaman] has assured that there will be no layoffs \u2013 and that\u2019s something we should honour.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet, that\u2019s easier said than done.<\/p>\n

Textiles, gems, jewellery, carpets and shrimp are some of India\u2019s biggest exports to the US \u2013 and are expected to\u00a0be among the worst hit by the tariffs.<\/p>\n

K Anand Kumar, who manages shrimp exporting company Sandhya Marines and employs nearly 3,500 workers in a coastal town in Andhra Pradesh state on the Bay of Bengal, said that his business is on the verge of collapse.<\/p>\n

More than 90 percent of his company\u2019s cargoes head to the US market.<\/p>\n

Last year, India exported an all-time high of 1.78 million metric tonnes of seafood worth $7.38bn. Shrimp dominates, contributing 92 percent of the total value. And the US takes in more than 40 percent of India\u2019s shrimp shipments.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe shrimp industry is a very highly labour-intensive sector, with small farmers,\u201d said Kumar, who also leads the seafood export association\u2019s Andhra Pradesh chapter. Taking everyone into account, Kumar said, nearly two million people are associated with shrimp exports.<\/p>\n

Kumar said more than 50 percent of those workers will bear the direct brunt of Trump\u2019s tariffs.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are already laying off because we can\u2019t keep paying salaries with no orders in line for us,\u201d Kumar told Al Jazeera. \u201cThe small farmers, who peel the shrimp, will be worst affected because there is no work now to employ them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Exporter associations estimate that the tariffs could affect nearly 55 percent of India\u2019s $87bn worth of merchandise exports to the US \u2013 and benefit competitors such as Vietnam, Bangladesh and China, which have been tariffed at lower rates.<\/p>\n

Moody\u2019s Ratings has noted that Trump\u2019s tariffs on Indian imports could slow India\u2019s economic growth. Beyond 2025, the ratings agency said, the much wider tariff gap compared with other Asia Pacific countries would severely curtail India\u2019s ambitions to develop its manufacturing sector and may even reverse some of the gains made in recent years in attracting related investments.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is like being in a nightmare,\u201d Kumar said, \u201cwhere you do not know what new, random tariff number you wake up to next.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the last 30 years of business with the US, Kumar said, the crisis feels uncharted. \u201cThe US is toying with us, doing whatever they want,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd we are forced to adjust. It feels so helpless.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"tariff\"An Indian flag, a 3D-printed miniature model depicting President Donald Trump and the phrase \u201850% tariffs\u2019 are seen in this illustration taken August 27, 2025 [Dado Ruvic\/Illustration\/Reuters]\u2018Embargo on Indian goods\u2019<\/p>\n

Nearly 1,000km (620 miles) from Kumar\u2019s factory, fear has taken over Tiruppur, a town in the southern state of Tamil Nadu that is the capital of India\u2019s garment export industry.<\/p>\n

Lying on the banks of the Noyyal river and next to rocky hillocks, Tiruppur contributes nearly a third of the total $16bn ready-to-wear garment exports. Tiruppur\u2019s earnings in US dollars have earned it the name of \u2018Dollar City\u2019. The world\u2019s top fashion brands, including Zara and Gap, source clothes from here.<\/p>\n

But while higher margins in the case of big brands give some businesses temporary breathing space, a prolonged crisis could cripple them, said V Elangovan, managing director of SNQS International Group, which exports garments.<\/p>\n

\u201cWherever margins are lower, the production has been halted altogether,\u201d he said.\u00a0Elangovan\u2019s company employs 1,500 people. He said about 150,000 workers stand to lose their jobs due to Trump\u2019s tariffs in Tiruppur.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is very difficult to find a new customer in this economy,\u201d he said. \u201cCustomer diversification is not like a switch, which we can turn on and off. Soon, in the future, we will be looking at cash flow issues, and there will be a lot of retrenchment of the workers.\u201d<\/p>\n

India\u2019s Modi has meanwhile taken a defiant stance on the trade war with the US.<\/p>\n

India \u201cshould become self-reliant \u2026 Economic selfishness is on the rise globally and we mustn\u2019t sit and cry about our difficulties,\u201d Modi said in his Independence Day speech on August 15 from the ramparts of New Delhi\u2019s Red Fort.<\/p>\n

\u201cModi will stand like a wall against any policy that threatens their interests. India will never compromise when it comes to protecting the interests of our farmers,\u201d the prime minister had said, referring indirectly to sticking points in trade negotiations with the US, which wants greater market access to India\u2019s agriculture and dairy sectors. Almost half of India\u2019s 1.4 billion people depend on agriculture for their livelihood.<\/p>\n

But traders fear that they could be left bleeding in the bargain.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government is letting us get punched in one eye to save the other eye,\u201d said Elangovan. \u201cA 50 percent tariff is practically an embargo on Indian goods.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Delhi, India \u2013 In a sprawling market in the Indian capital, Anuj Gupta sits in a corner…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30323,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[174],"tags":[2786,79,3426,356,179,18,3617,19,387,17,12604,3429,384,3430],"class_list":{"0":"post-30322","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-asia","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-business-and-economy","11":"tag-donald-trump","12":"tag-economy","13":"tag-eire","14":"tag-features","15":"tag-ie","16":"tag-india","17":"tag-ireland","18":"tag-narendra-modi","19":"tag-trade-war","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-us-canada"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30322\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}