Robert Persaud seeks to reassure us, but about the wrong risk

Foreign Secretary Robert Persaud’s statement on the United States' 12.5 percent tariff, quoted in Demerara Waves, answers a charge the Americans did not make. The action taken by the United States Trade Representative, Ambassador Jamieson Greer, under section 301 of the US Trade Act is not a finding that Guyanese goods are made with forced labour. It is a finding that Guyana, with fifty-nine other economies, has failed to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labour. The charge concerns our statute book, not our exports.