I haven't seen the details on the shrimp tariff. And depending on what it is or isn't it may or may not be appropriate.
I don't have a big issue with Vietnam, they are an up and coming producer. (With respect to Shrimp, not so-called-catfish) But Chinese communists are definitely not playing fair. Their state owned aquaculture industry is massively subsidized as a way to gain hard currency for the gov't. A huge portion of China's positive TB is in private investment, the gov't only gets a slice of it. The aquaculture industry is mostly state owned.
One of the most eggregious aspects of this is that they are using USDA genetic selection program shrimp as stock. We have taxpayer subsidized research into selecting shrimp with good growth and disease tolerance in aquaculture environments. These improved strains of shrimp have massively improved the Chi-coms aquaculture industry. After tens (hundreds?) of millions of taxpayer funded research, the Chicoms bought miproved broodstock shrimp for a few hundred bucks. Another aspect of the dumping are the trace anti-biotics. The EU blocked all Chinese shrimp when there were trace amounts of banned for human consumption anti-biotics found, but they were under the threshhold of American standards. So it all got dumped here.
How this all plays out is what is an appropriate tariff. If it is narrowly targetted at the Chicoms, I fully support it, and it won't have much effect on shrimp price. If it is too broad, especially if it affects countries like Ecuador and Thailand, then it is trade protection and is inappropriate.
Thank you for your informed information and comment. I am mostly against tarrifs and such and ultimately think that the consumer should get the ultimate benefit. Also if the govt. would get out of the way maybe a domestic shrimp farming industry could develop.