2025-02-13 20:37

Trump calls India tariffs 'unfair', limits access to U.S. India, U.S. set for early trade talks Initial segments of trade deal to be negotiated by fall 2025 India to raise U.S. energy purchases to $25 bln from $15 bln Two countries agree to aggressively address illegal immigration WASHINGTON, Feb 13 (Reuters) - India and the U.S. agreed on Thursday to start talks to clinch an early trade deal and resolve their standoff over tariffs as New Delhi promised to buy more U.S. oil, gas and military equipment and fight illegal immigration. The series of agreements emerged after talks between U.S. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the White House, just hours after Trump railed against the climate for U.S. businesses in India and unveiled a roadmap for reciprocal tariffs on countries that put duties on U.S. imports. "Prime Minister Modi recently announced the reductions to India's unfair, very strong tariffs that limit us access to the Indian market, very strongly," Trump said. "And really it's a big problem I must say." The deal to resolve trade concerns could be done within the next seven months, said India's Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri. A joint statement after the meeting said Washington welcomed New Delhi's recent steps to lower tariffs on select U.S. products and increase market access to U.S. farm products, while seeking to negotiate the initial segments of a trade deal by the fall of 2025. While both leaders "had their perspectives" on tariffs, "what is more remarkable...is the fact that we have a way forward on this issue," Misri said. Some of the leaders' agreements are aspirational: India wants to increase by "billions of dollars" its purchases of U.S. defense equipment and may make Washington the "number one supplier" of oil and gas, Trump said at a joint press conference with Modi. And Delhi wants to double trade with Washington by 2030, Modi said. Long-planned cooperation on nuclear energy, also discussed by the leaders, faces ongoing legal challenges. "We're also paving the way to ultimately provide India with the F-35 stealth fighters," said Trump. Misri, the Indian official, later said the F-35 deal was a proposal at this point, with no formal process underway. The White House did not respond to a request for comment on any deal. WHAT TRUMP WANTS Although Trump had a warm relationship with Modi in his first term, he again said on Thursday that India's tariffs were "very high" and promised to match them, even after his earlier levies on steel and aluminum hit metal-producing India particularly hard. "We are being reciprocal with India," Trump said during the press conference. "Whatever India charges, we charge them." Modi vowed to protect India's interests. "One thing that I deeply appreciate, and I learn from President Trump, is that he keeps the national interest supreme," Modi said. "Like him, I also keep the national interest of India at the top of everything else." The two leaders praised each other and agreed to deepen security cooperation in the Indo-Pacific, a thinly veiled reference to competition with China, as well as to start joint production on technologies like artificial intelligence. Asked before the meeting about the steps India was taking, one source described it as a "gift" for Trump designed to lower trade tensions. A Trump aide said that the president sees defense and energy sales to India lowering the U.S. trade deficit. India's energy purchases from the U.S. could go up to $25 billion in the near future from $15 billion last year, India's Misri said, adding that this could contribute to reducing the trade deficit. Tariffs will continue to dominate the two countries' relationship, said Richard Rossow, head of the India program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank. "It's going to be a boxing match," he said. "India is willing to take a few hits, but there's a limit." The U.S. has a $45.6 billion trade deficit with India. Overall, the U.S. trade-weighted average tariff rate has been about 2.2%, according to World Trade Organization data, compared with India's 12%. FIGHT ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION Trump wants more help from India on unauthorized immigration. India is a major source of immigrants to the United States, including a large number in the tech industry on work visas and others in the U.S. illegally. The joint statement said the two countries agreed to aggressively address illegal immigration and human trafficking by strengthening law enforcement cooperation. India may prove critical to Trump's strategy to thwart China, which many in his administration see as the top U.S. rival. India is wary of neighboring China's military buildup and competes for many of the same markets. Modi also worries that Trump could cut a deal with China that excludes India, according to Mukesh Aghi, president of the U.S.-India Strategic Partnership Forum lobbying group. India has continued its ties with Russia as it carries out its war with Ukraine. India has remained a major consumer of Russian energy, for instance, while the West has worked to cut its own consumption since the war started. "The world had this thinking that India somehow is a neutral country in this whole process," said Modi. "But this is not true. India has a side, and that side is of peace." Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/indias-modi-brings-tariff-gift-trump-talks-2025-02-13/

2025-02-13 20:30

Rollins confirmed in a 72-28 vote Will lead USDA amid low farm income, federal workforce reduction Has said causes of climate change 'not widely understood' Feb 13 (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Thursday voted to confirm Brooke Rollins, a longtime ally of President Donald Trump and former White House policy advisor who has expressed doubt about climate change, to lead the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Rollins will head an agency with 100,000 employees that oversees farm programs, food benefits, and school meals. Her appointment comes at a time of low farm income, potential cuts to domestic food aid, and an aggressive campaign to reduce the federal workforce led by billionaire Elon Musk. The Senate voted 72 to 28 to confirm Rollins, after its Agriculture Committee held Rollins' nomination hearing on January 23 and on February 3 advanced her unanimously. Rollins spent 15 years as the head of a conservative Texas policy organization backed by the oil industry. Under her tenure, the group produced reports criticizing ethanol and farm subsidies. In her nomination hearing, Rollins said the reports were decades old and did not reflect her current policy positions, and that she supports ethanol. The American Coalition for Ethanol's CEO Brian Jennings said in a statement that the group looks forward to working with Rollins on finalizing the 45Z clean fuel tax credit and expanding biofuel infrastructure. In follow-up questions after her nomination hearing, Rollins was asked by Agriculture Committee ranking member Amy Klobuchar if she believes climate change is a threat to U.S. farmers and ranchers. She replied, "We all know the climate changes throughout the year, but the cause and solutions are not widely understood or defined," according to a copy of her responses seen by Reuters. House Agriculture Committee chairman Glenn "GT" Thompson and ranking member Angie Craig both said in statements that Rollins was assuming the role at a critical time for agriculture and they looked forward to collaboration. Rollins was acting director of the White House Domestic Policy Council in Trump's first administration, and then led the America First Policy Institute, a Trump-aligned policy group. The Trump administration's freeze on most foreign aid and some farm grant and loan programs has led to work stoppages at a network of agricultural research labs and has meant some farmers are not getting expected government payments. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-senate-confirms-brooke-rollins-lead-usda-2025-02-13/

2025-02-13 20:13

Feb 13 (Reuters) - The mid-sized coffee merchant Central do Cafe in Brazil's Minas Gerais state suspended operations temporarily starting this week, seeking to renegotiate its debts, according to a note shared by farmers on Thursday and local media. The shortage in global coffee supplies had sent prices soaring to record highs. Some merchants and commodities traders have felt the strain. They are exposed if farmers are unable to deliver contracted volumes, and they also have financial exposure to rising prices in coffee futures. Brazilian coffee traders Atlantica and Cafebras won a grace period in courts late last year to renegotiate debts with clients after the firms said they were impacted by defaults from farmers. Central do Cafe is based in Muzambinho, in the South Minas Gerais region, where most of the coffee farms are located in the state. It buys coffee from local producers and sells it to roasters or exporters. Minas Gerais is the top coffee producing state in Brazil, the world's top coffee supplier. A notice from the company to its clients shared by a farmer with Reuters said the firm would be closed for an undetermined period while it evaluates its financial situation. "We will soon call employees and business partners for meetings," Central do Cafe said in the notice, adding that the pause on its operations was necessary while it tries to renegotiate some of its debts. A local newspaper in the town also published the statement from the company. Reuters was unable to contact the company in Brazil. Arabica coffee futures in New York , a global benchmark, rose 70% last year and are up 37% so far this year due to limited supplies in the market. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/coffee-merchant-brazils-minas-gerais-suspends-operations-2025-02-13/

2025-02-13 19:56

LONDON, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Europe could see a record level of new data centres this year, according to research released on Thursday by CBRE Group, as companies expand their artificial intelligence and cloud computing activities. Demand for data centre capacity has skyrocketed in recent years, along with the energy needed to power them, as companies tap into new technologies to run their businesses. The European market could see data centres that account for 937 megawatts worth of power demand come online in 2025, which would mark a new record for the region, CBRE, the commercial real estate services and investment firm, said. That would equal a jump of 282MW, or 43%, from the 655MW of capacity delivered in 2024, the company said. "The data centre construction boom will continue unabated. Available power and appropriate land, government incentives, and hyperscaler ambitions are key factors that are driving the rapid growth of markets such as Milan, as well as the continued expansion of leading markets like London and Frankfurt," said Kevin Restivo, head of European data centre research at CBRE. Over half of the expected new capacity - 57% - is expected to be delivered in the leading European data centre markets, namely Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris and Dublin, according to CBRE. Customer appetite for capacity has grown rapidly, despite difficulties for providers in sourcing power and land for new facilities, CBRE said. CBRE said it expected double-digit supply growth in five of the 10 secondary European markets they track in 2025. Seven of those, including Milan and Madrid, are expected to have 100MW of supply or more by year-end, up from just four markets at the end of 2022. (This story has been refiled to change the day to Thursday, not Wednesday, in paragraph 1) Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/technology/europe-set-see-record-data-centre-capacity-roll-out-2025-cbre-says-2025-02-13/

2025-02-13 19:44

WASHINGTON, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Bird flu infections were detected among cattle veterinarians tested last fall, including two people with no known exposure to animals with the virus, according to a report released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday. Bird flu has infected nearly 70 people in the U.S., with one death, since last April. Most of those infections have been among farmworkers exposed to infected poultry or cows. The CDC report said the virus was found in three out of 150 veterinarians who were tested in September 2024. Two of those veterinarians were not exposed to animals known to be sick with bird flu, and one was not practicing in a state where bird flu had been detected among cattle. None of the veterinarians reported flu symptoms or conjunctivitis, which has been a common symptom of bird flu among infected farmworkers, the report said. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, said the lack of information about the prevalence of human cases is frustrating. "We need much closer surveillance," he said. "We need to continue to look, especially in the poultry and dairy industry." The findings suggest there could be dairy cattle infected in more states than currently known, the study said. Bird flu has infected nearly 1,000 dairy herds in 16 states, most recently California and Nevada, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The agency said on February 5 that it had detected a second strain of bird flu among dairy herds in Nevada. The U.S. Department of Agriculture since December has been rolling out a nationwide mandatory milk testing program to detect bird flu. For months, human and animal health experts have warned of undercounts of bird flu cases as farmers and workers have in some cases resisted testing. Farmers have worried about lost income due to quarantining their dairy herds if they test positive, and workers about lost pay from mandatory isolation and missed work. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/bird-flu-detected-among-us-veterinarians-tested-last-year-cdc-says-2025-02-13/

2025-02-13 19:42

WASHINGTON, Feb 13 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that BRICS nations could face 100% tariffs from the United States "if they want to play games with the dollar." "If any trading gets through, it'll be 100% tariff, at least," he said in response to a question about the BRICS nations - Brazil, Russia, India and China - setting up their own currency. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-warns-brics-nations-could-face-100-tariffs-2025-02-13/