WASHINGTON D.C. — On Thursday, July 31, 2025, US President Donald Trump gave the small African country of Lesotho a modified tariff rate of 15%. This change comes as the country is still dealing with the economic effects of earlier threats from the Trump administration to raise tariffs by a lot, which created a lot of worry and disruption.
President Trump changed “reciprocal tariff rates” for dozens of countries in a new executive order. Lesotho was one of the most important ones. In April of this year, Lesotho was in danger of having to pay a 50% tariff rate, which would have been the highest amount imposed on any US trading partner. This raised concerns about how it would affect the country’s important textile industry.
The Trump administration has always said that its tariff rates are fair since they are the same as the hefty duties that other countries put on US exports. The White House has already said that Lesotho levied 99% tariffs on US goods in Lesotho’s case. Lesotho officials, on the other hand, have said that they don’t understand how the US government came up with that number, which shows that the basis for the reciprocal calculation is different.
After the first announcement of a lot of tariffs in April, the Trump administration put off putting them into effect. The purpose of this halt was to give the nations that were affected a chance to talk and maybe change their own tariff regimes.
The fear of high tariffs and the fact that they aren’t guaranteed have already hurt Lesotho’s economy in a real way. A lot of US importers cancelled orders for textiles made in Lesotho because they thought prices would go up. This caused a lot of people to lose their jobs in the sector, which is a big employer in the Southern African country. For example, Teboho Kobeli, the owner of Afri-Expo, a company that makes jeans for export, told Reuters earlier that he was very worried about the high tariffs. He said, “If we still have these high tariffs, it means we must forget about producing for the U.S. and go as fast as we can… (looking for) other available markets.”
The cut to a 15% tariff, which is still an increase for Lesotho, should help its struggling export-oriented industries, especially textiles and apparel. These industries benefit from preferential trade access to the US market through programs like the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA). But the Trump administration’s overall message stays the same: it wants “fair” and “reciprocal” trade conditions with its partners across the world.