On the sidelines of the Group of 20 major economies (G20) summit held earlier in Osaka, Japan, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump on Saturday agreed to restart economic and trade consultations between their countries on the basis of equality and mutual respect, injecting much-needed confidence into the global economy and markets.
"We welcome the progress made during this meeting and hope it will result in a constructive approach to working with China to deliver significant reforms rather than one that punishes American consumers and threatens U.S. jobs through tariffs," David French, senior vice president for government relations at the National Retail Federation, said in a statement.
"Pulling back from the brink of further tariff escalation is a good sign for retailers and their customers, and we look forward to continued progress in the talks with China so that further tariffs can be avoided and existing ones lifted," said French.
Nagle told Xinhua that "hopefully these tariffs that are, we hope are, temporary in nature are able to be eliminated so that there is more stability and certainty in the trade environment on both the U.S. and China exports and imports."
Ennis also urged removal of additional tariffs imposed over the past few months. "Our hope is that this gets resolved quickly and there will be a plan of action to reduce and ultimately eliminate all of the tariffs that have been put into place on both sides," she said, "because that's the only way that we can get back to anything that resembles a normal trade between the United States and China."