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Sorghum field on Grand Island, Nebraska: American exports have been heavily taxed by Beijing (illustration). Getty Images / Joel Sartore

The United States and China sign the first phase of a trade agreement on Wednesday. Details of this text will be made public from the White House in Washington. A truce in a long-term trade war.

The Chinese delegation is hard at work in Washington, reports our correspondent in Beijing, Stéphane Lagarde . Pending the signing of the agreement, American negotiators have withdrawn the expression " currency manipulator " to designate China. After the signing of the phase 1 agreement, the US government will publish some of the details of the agreement, the state press in China said.

► Read also : Trade war: China confirms the signing of a preliminary agreement

A two-year standoff

The trade showdown between China and the United States has been going on for two years, with the introduction of customs taxes in January 2018 on part of Chinese exports to the United States.

The first to suffer the wrath of the Americans were solar panels and washing machines. China is the world's largest producer of photovoltaic panels and the leading exporter of washing machines to the United States. Taxes affect an industry already heavily hit, a few years before by a similar conflict with Europe. The Chinese then retort by taxing American sorghum, which represents $ 1 billion in exports.

► Read also : Sino-American truce, the agricultural markets in expectation

War is declared. The rest of the world is, despite itself, swept away, with the increase in taxes on steel and aluminum, from which the European Union and China will suffer the most.

From list to list, out of the blue, products are taxed to the tune of several hundred billion dollars in this conflict which the world economy is starting to suffer. A conflict that affects the two Chinese communication giants, ZTE and Huawei , with which American companies can no longer trade.

This first phase of the Sino-American agreement is therefore only a truce. And if the Chinese trade surplus with the United States fell by 8 and a half percent in 2019, it still remains high. They currently stand at $ 46 billion.