By Renata Brito
Maseru, Lesotho (AP) – The deafening roars of hundreds of sewing machines are silent. The spool of thread of all colours is covered in dust. The warehouse is dark and empty.
In Lesotho’s small African country, the business of clothing manufacturer Tzicc has dried up in the face of tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump. A few months ago, my work was stable. The factory’s 1,300 employees created and exported sportswear to American stores, including JCPenney, Walmart and Costco.
However, when Trump announced in April that he would wipe out new tariffs on almost all US trading partners, Lesotho was at the top of the list, realizing that at a 50% rate, the economy is higher than that of China, 8,000 times larger. Experts here and in the economy said they were confused.
Since then, Trump has temporarily retreated. During a months-long suspension due to trade talks, the US charged a baseline 10% tariff and announced new fees in dozens of countries starting Friday. Lesotho’s rate is set on Trump’s whim, with aides suggesting that tariffs charged on goods from small African countries could be in the top 10% of the 10%.
Many countries have received letters laying out new tariffs. With a suspension set to expire on Friday, Lesotho officials say they haven’t received it and say Trump is in a country where officials simply don’t have time to negotiate one-on-one. Leaders, and the 12,000 people employed in clothing factories exporting to the US market, are still waiting.
The damage has already spread through Lesotho’s economy, which is made up of the largest private industry in 2024 with over 30,000 workers.
For Tzicc and its customers, the threat and obvious single from Lesotho was enough. Management decided to hurry to deliver existing orders before tariffs resume. However, American buyers have stopped new orders. Without work left, virtually all factory employees were sent home.
“Well, unfortunately, we’ve finished,” said Rahila Omar, the factory’s compliance manager, pointing to the irony of the strategy while walking between the queues of machines covered in silence. “So we don’t have a job right now.”
Omar is one of the few employees left in the creepy, quiet factory. Some remain in the accounting department. Others will empty leftover stocks to warehouses elsewhere.
Officials and workers fear this is a sign of what will come for other factories in Lesotho. There, poverty is widespread within a population of 2 million, with most textile workers supporting their families on their own.
The man climbs the Ha Lejong hill in Lesotho, and the unemployment rate is near 40% on Tuesday, July 22, 2025 (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)
Workers will load the last box filled with empty Tzicc clothing factory clothing factory clothing threats on Tuesday, July 22, 2025, into trucks, following the US-imposed tariff threat in Maseru, Lesotho (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)
On Tuesday, July 22, 2025, industrial iron is on a work bench inside an empty Tzicc clothing factory following the threat of US taxation in Maseru, Lesotho (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)
The machine is covered with sheets inside an empty Tzicc clothing factory following the threat of US tariffs imposed in Maseru, Lesotho on Tuesday, July 22, 2025 (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)
Compliance Manager Rahila Omar walks the empty corridor inside the Tzicc clothing factory on Tuesday, July 22, 2025, following the threat of US taxation in Maseru, Lesotho.
On Tuesday, July 22, 2025, following the threat of US taxation in Maseru, Lesotho, sewing machines line up inside an empty tzicc clothing factory.
The view from the summit will be seen on Tuesday, July 22nd, 2025 at Halejon, Lesotho.
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The man climbs the Ha Lejong hill in Lesotho, and the unemployment rate is near 40% on Tuesday, July 22, 2025 (AP Photo/Bram Janssen)
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Lesotho’s small economy was threatened by huge tariffs
In March, a month before slamming Lesotho with 50% tariffs, Trump described it as a place “no one ever heard of it,” and struggled to pronounce the country’s name in a speech criticizing US foreign aid.
It is true that Lesotho is a “very small economy” and as explained by its own trade minister, Mokety Sherrill.
However, his relationship with Washington dates back decades. The United States was the first country to open an embassy in its capital after Lesotho declared independence from Britain in 1966. The military was trained by the US, with hundreds of millions of people sent to Lesotho with US funds to fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic through current abolition offices and the Peffer program.
As textiles became Lesotho’s major exports, Lesotho became known as the denim capital of Africa, with around 75% of its products being sent to the US. If Americans buy jeans from American brands like Wrangler or Levi, they may be “made in Lesotho,” as the tag still points out.
In 2000, the US signed the African Growth and Opportunity Act, allowing Lesotho and other African countries to export US duty-free goods.
Shelile said he was in the process of negotiating a September update for Agoa when he woke up in the middle of the night, by text from an aide who has 50% US tariff news.
“No, this is not realistic,” Cher remembers thinking. “What did we do to deserve this?”
According to the Trump administration, Lesotho is charging 99% tariffs on US goods. The government here said it had no idea how the US calculated it.
In theory, tariff decisions were based on trade deficits. Lesotho’s exports to the US last year amounted to around $240 million (mainly clothing and diamonds), while imports from the US cost just $2.8 million. But in reality, mathematics is more complicated than that. And in reality, Lesotho simply can’t afford to import more US products. Almost half of the population lives under the poverty line.
“The trade deficit that exists between Lesotho and the US is a natural trade deficit that can occur if there is these types of disparities between the two economies,” Shelile said. “It cannot be violated and certainly cannot be violated by imposing customs duties.”
Lesotho declared a state of emergency over unemployment rate
Last year, Lesotho’s overall unemployment rate was around 30%, national data shows. For people under 35, that was almost 50%.
The threat of tariffs has exacerbated the issue of national unemployment and has urged the government to declare a disaster situation this month.
“No matter how you slice it, there have already been a lot of losses,” Shelile says. “People have lost a lot of money, and then they’ll come back to where we were before this took a long time.”
Most of the 12,000 people employed in 11 factories in Lesotho, the women who export to the US are women with children who pay for feeding and tuition fees.
Of those, 9,000 jobs face direct fires, with another 40,000 people going to suffer indirectly from US-imposed tariffs, Shelile said.
“We’re talking about real estate people who lease a few rooms,” he said. “We’re talking about people in transit whether it’s long haul to the port, long haul to the port, or taxi drivers who take people to work in the morning. They’re affected.”
Mapontso Mathunya once worked in the floor of the cutting chamber at Tzicc, but is now unemployed. Her husband doesn’t have a stable job either. With two young children, Mathunya was a family’s earner. She is now trying to sell snacks and cigarettes on the streets, but she finds it a daily struggle to bring a few cents home.
“We’re a heavy financial burden,” she said. “Things are bad.”
The future of this factory and others remains in scope
The future of the TZICC plant will depend on what will happen on Friday, compliance manager Omar said.
The factory, owned by Taiwanese citizens, has been in business since mid-1999. During the peak month, we made up up to 1.5 million pieces of clothing for JCPenney.
TZICC’s major US customers – JCPenney, Walmart and Costco did not reply to the AP to comment.
One of the solutions proposed by the trade minister and industry consultants, pivots to the nearby South African market, is not enough to cover employee pay, Omar said.
And even if American buyers return, it’s unlikely that the factory will be able to rehire all 1,300 workers, she added.
Today, a former employee, just a few blocks away, is testing his luck by searching for jobs in other factories that are still operating. Most of them turn their backs.
“Life is difficult,” said Matunha, a former worker. “Nothing, nothing. People don’t have money.”
Contributors were Pascarina Kabi of Masel, Josh Bork of Washington, and Anne Dinonzio of New York.
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Original issue: July 30th, 2025, 12:54pm EDT
