Sao Paulo, 29 August (Argus) -- Brazil has started the process of developing reciprocal tariffs against the US, vice-president and trade minister Geraldo Alckmin said, a move designed to speed up negotiations.

Brazil's foreign trade chamber, Camex, has 30 days to determine how the 50pc tariffs the US imposed on Brazil effective 6 August can be countered under the country's economic reciprocity law approved in April. The law authorizes retaliation through goods, services and intellectual property.

There is no time frame for the process of imposing reciprocal tariffs after the initial 30-day deliberation period.

"Brazil will not give up on its sovereignty," Alckmin said this week during a visit to Mexico, where he signed two cooperation agreements on biofuels with Mexico as well as a letter of intent on agriculture. "I hope that [this process] will help accelerate dialogue and negotiations [with the US], which is what president Lula has been asking us to do."

The move comes weeks after President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had said that Brazil would not reciprocate the tariffs but seek to negotiate.

Brazil has been working to counter the tariffs' effect on its economy by supporting companies in efforts to find new markets, and by approving a line of credit to small businesses hurt by the measures. Earlier this month, Brazil asked the World Trade Organization to intervene in the dispute over tariffs.

The US typically runs a trade surplus for goods and services with Brazil, which has totaled more than $400bn over the last 15 years, finance minister Fernando Haddad said in a televised interview in early July. In the first half of 2025 the US' trade surplus with Brazil reached $2.3bn, a more than seven-fold increase from a year before, according to US-Brazil chamber of commerce Amcham.