Trade protectionism through high tariffs has always been considered as damaging barriers in the way of smooth flow of international trade, which has the potential of causing a serious economic damage to the global economy. These barriers could be more damaging to the developing and emerging economies as such countries may not gain access to the appropriate markets for trading their products which, in turn, may cause a great loss to their domestic industry, resulting in a soaring unemployment rate and consequent poverty.

A numerous efforts were made in the past to find out a common platform for entering into multilateral negotiations for removing the barriers of tariffs and quotas for boosting trade across the globe.

Through the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and, later on, the World Trade Organization (WTO), the partner countries were able to find ways and means to gradually remove and soften tariffs and other trade restrictions by restraining countries from setting higher tariffs unilaterally.

However, the ripples caused by the recent US policy of imposing full spectrum tariff regime on trading partners across the globe has shaken confidence of many countries in the free flow of global trade as the policy is being seen as a barrier to access of their products and services to the US markets.

In this age of globalization where simultaneous investments across various foreign and business-friendly jurisdictions is a norm rather than the exception, imposing a higher trade tariff regime on the trading partners across the world is unheard of in a prevalent trading ecosystem.

The initiated tariff plan imposes heavy tariff........

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