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The din of power tools making flatpack furniture for export markets filled a Vietnam warehouse on Thursday, as toiling workers fretted about their livelihoods despite the country’s new US trade deal.

‘There’s definitely a sense of worry. A lot of worry,’ 30-year-old factory worker Nguyen Thi Nhi told AFP in southern Ho Chi Minh City.

Vietnam has the third-biggest trade surplus with the United States of any country and was targeted with one of the highest rates in Donald Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariff blitz.

A deal announced late Wednesday has averted a threatened 46 per cent levy, but the country is still set to face a minimum 20 per cent rate in return for opening its market to US products.

Before Trump’s second term the average US tariff on Vietnam was around four per cent, according to Bloomberg Economics, which predicts the deal may cost the country two per cent of gross domestic product.

Van Hue Furniture — on the northern fringes of Ho Chi Minh City — was preparing to export its products to the United States when plans were halted by Trump’s April 2 bombshell, which hit trading partners globally.

While the deal announced Wednesday averts the eye-watering rate he had threatened, it has done little to allay anxieties on the factory floor.

‘Orders are uncertain, we don’t know what to expect,’ said Nhi, as colleagues sandpapered lengths of timber and sprayed them white, manufacturing bed frames shipped in boxes stamped ‘Made in Vietnam’.

‘We just hope the tariffs are lowered so the company can receive more orders and workers here can have a more stable life,’ she said.

‘With the 20 per cent rate, the situation is looking more positive,’ said Van Hue Furniture chairman and CEO Nguyen Huu Hue.

‘Over the past three to four months, US partners have enquired about our products,’ the 49-year-old said. ‘I hope that once the 20 per cent tariff policy is confirmed, orders will begin to materialise.’

But details of the deal remain scant.

A Vietnam foreign ministry spokesman told reporters on Thursday that negotiators were still ‘in detailed discussion to concretise agreements’.

The deal is the first full pact Trump has sealed with an Asian nation, and analysts say it may give a glimpse of the template Washington will use with other countries still scrambling for accords.

Trump has said a key clause of the deal commands a 40 per cent tariff on goods ‘transshipped’ through Vietnam in a bid to skirt higher rates imposed on other countries.

Washington has accused Hanoi of using the practice to bring Chinese goods to US markets at lower rates, but Chinese raw materials are the lifeblood of Vietnam’s manufacturing industry.

It’s unclear how the deal will be policed to ensure it targets ‘transshipped’ goods rather than hobbling manufacturers with Chinese suppliers, analysts say, predicting Beijing will view the move as an affront.

‘Certain concepts, such as rules of origin, remain vague,’ said Hanoi-based Ngo Sy Hoai, vice-chairman and general secretary of the Vietnam Timber and Forest Products Association.

‘We need clearer explanations — especially regarding origin requirements and how traceability will be handled,’ he added.

‘From my perspective, this will be very difficult to implement and will create obstacles for businesses in both countries.’

Hue has already pivoted his furniture business away from the United States to hedge against the uncertainty.

‘Facing tariff challenges, we’ve accelerated our efforts to reach markets in Japan and Europe,’ he said. ‘Even if tariffs do take a toll, we can still maintain our manufacturing position.’