An uninhabited Antarctic outpost that was populated by penguins. One of the smallest economies in the world. An Arctic archipelago with more polar bears than humans.
In order to quote Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, it really seems that “nowhere on earth is safe” by US President Donald Trump’s comprehensive tariffs.
Trump rattled the markets, manufacturers and more Wednesday, which announce a baseline of 10 percent tariffs for imports to the USA – and far higher in goods from some locations, especially with high trade surpluses with the states. When enforcing its steep and wide tariffs, the analysts suggested that Trump increased the global order.
For many observers, however, the most puzzling aspect of Trump’s list was that it contained some of the most remote and smallest areas and islands in the world. Places that are largely inhabited by penguins in some cases.
Like Australia’s Heard and McDonald Islands in the subantarctic region, one of the most distant places on earth, and, according to the website of the Australian government, only about 242 times have been visited by humans since 1855.
“The Heard and McDonald Islands are completely uninhabited. Population zero. I think we will divide the seagulls?” wrote Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, Senior Fellow in the American Immigration Council, about X.
In this sense, there are some of these areas, the tariffs that they are exposed to – and what they actually export.
Area of the British Indian Ocean: 10%
The area of the British Indian Ocean is an archipelago with 58 islands with around 640,000 square kilometers of ocean, about halfway between East Africa and Indonesia.
It is not a tourist destination. Access is limited and according to the territory website, you need permission to travel there. It has no constant population, but according to the CIA Factbook, around 3,000 US and British military personnel and civilian contractors live on the island of Diego Garcia.
According to the US Census Bureau, the US imports amounted to around 462,500 US dollars in 2024. The top raw materials were computer and electronic products, followed by cattle and cattle products.
According to the CIA Factbook, all economic activities concentrated on Diego Garcia, where “construction projects and various services are carried out to support the military and contractual assistant from Great Britain, Mauritius, the Philippines and the USA”.
Heard and McDonald Islands: 10%
The Heard and McDonald Islands in the remote Antarctic together form an uninhabited Australian territory. The mostly barren islands between Madagascar and Antarctic have two active volcanoes and can only be reached by sea.
“Due to the extreme insulation … Together with the persistently storm and sea conditions, human activities in the region were limited and remained limited,” says the website of the Antarctic program of the Australian government.
And yet the US imports of the uninhabited islands amounted to $ 13,590 in 2024 in 2024. This mainly consisted of electrical devices and devices, computer and electronic programs as well as transport equipment.
A report in the Guardian suggests that some of the data for this islands and for Norfolk Island can come from misstaired programs.
The CIA Facebook does not list economic activity for Heard and McDonald Islands and said that they are “populated by a large number of bird species, seals and penguins”, and that “the islands are mainly used for research, whereby only limited fishing is permitted in the surrounding waters”.
US President Donald Trump’s comprehensive “liberation day” Mutual tariffs were described as “carefully planned”, but among the goals the congested African nation of Lesotho, an island home of a US Air Force, and Australia’s Heard Island and McDonald Islands -most residents are Penguins.
Norfolk Island: 29%
Norfolk Island in the Pacific, another Australian territory with around 2,000 people, received more serious tariff treatment.
According to the Calculation of the Trump government, the former British criminal colony is calculated 58 percent in the United States – and it has reacted with a tariff of 29 percent on the island, whose economy revolves around tourism. It is about 1,600 kilometers east of Sydney.
George Plant, Administrator of Norfolk Island, the representative of the Australian government, examined it.
“As far as I know, we do not export anything to the United States,” he told the Associated Press. “We do not calculate tariffs for anything. I also cannot imagine non-tariff obstacles that are available, so we scratch ourselves here.”
According to the US Census Bureau, their US imports in 2024 amounted to around 191,000 US dollars. The vast majority of them were given back under a “goods back” category, which was returned after it was otherwise imported to the USA.
According to CIA Facebook, the territory’s economy is a high income with the most important tourism and re-exporting industries.
Norfolk Island, an external territory in the Pacific, was hit by US President Donald Trump’s 29 percent tariffs, although it had no known exports to the states. Jesse Schiller and Rachel Evans, two Canadians who run a shop on the island, explain how they react to the tariff.
Svalbard and Jan Mayen: 10%
Jan Mayen is a small Arctic island with more polar bears than people. The CIA Factbook describes it as “bleak” and “sterile”.
The only residents of Jan Mayen, part of Norway since 1930, have been employees of the Norwegian military and the Norwegian meteorological institute. The island – 600 kilometers northeast of Iceland – is partly covered by glaciers.
Svalbard is a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. Almost 3,000 people, most of them in the northernmost urban community in the world, Longyearbyen, live there, according to the Svalbard Tourism website.
The two regions are now exposed to 10 percent tariffs. According to the US Census Bureau, US imports in 2024 amounted to almost $ 42,000. This consisted largely of non-electric machines, followed by computer and electronic products.
According to the CIA Factbook, the economy of Svalbard mostly consists of coal mining, tourism and research, an important whaling and fishing base, and also houses the global sowing range. The factbook does not list anything for Jan Mayen’s economy and said that “only occasionally visited by Sealjäger and Fallenlingen over the centuries”.
Tonki: 10%
This nation consists of three tropical coral islands and houses 1,500 people in a combined land area of 10 square kilometers.
Tokelau, one of the smallest economies in the South Pacific, survives the subsistence agriculture, fishing and financing from New Zealand, which counts the islands as one of their territories.
According to the US Census Bureau, their US imports in 2024 amounted to a total of 177,600 US dollars. Almost all of this stood under a category “Other special classification regulations” or elements that do not fit properly into other categories. According to CIA Facebook, most exports from Tokelau are cars, telephones, clothing, iron fastening elements and fabric. The United States is not listed as one of its main trading partners.
According to the website of the Commonwealth Chamber of Commerce, Tokelau has one of the smallest economies in the world, and its main sources of income are the sale of Kopra (dried coconut products), postage stamps, souvenir coins, craft and transfers from relatives in New Zealand.
Cocos (Keeling) Islands: 10%
These 27 coral islands are located in the Indian Ocean between Australia and Indonesia and form about 14 square kilometers. According to the CIA Factbook, only about 593 people live there.
Most of the economy is based on agriculture (such as bananas, paws and coconuts), tourism and COPRA products.
For a small series of islands, the US imports were around 1.1 million US dollars on the larger side. The largest category was “returned”, followed by computer and electronics products and transport equipment.
The CIA Factbook says the islands send 31 percent of their exports – ships – to the USA
