White House takes action to lower the costs of must-have imports like coffee and cocoa

 

 

CHICAGO, November 17, 2025 — The White House has taken what it says is a first step in bringing down the prices of such imported food-away-from-home staples as coffee, bananas, and cocoa. 

The Trump Administration announced last week that it has struck new trade deals with four South American sources of the products, none of which are or can be produced at scale in the United States. The agreements call for lowering the import duties on supplies that can only be sourced from abroad, a request the FAFH industry has sounded since President Trump first aired a schedule of protectionist tariffs in April.

In exchange for the carve-outs and other trade concessions included in the new pacts, the four nations have agreed to facilitate the import of goods from the U.S.

The four countries involved are Argentina, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Ecuador.

No timeline for setting new tariffs on the imported items was revealed.

The agreements are good news for the domestic food industry, which has cited coffee, cocoa, and bananas as prime examples of staples that have to be offered to U.S. consumers but are being pushed out of affordability by Trump’s tariffs. 

Industry groups like the National Restaurant Association have urged the White House to exempt all foods and beverages from the tariffs, noting that edible imports account for a small portion of what’s brought into the nation. They stress that a blanket exemption would not materially erode Trump’s efforts to close the nation’s trade deficit.

Nor, they say, would a food and beverage carve-out weigh against the President’s efforts to foster domestic sourcing of supplies that are currently imported in volume. Many of the products universally found in commercial conditions could never be grown in the U.S. because of North America's climate and soil conditions. 

Summaries of the deals can be found here. 

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