Minister of Agriculture John Steenhuisen has described the position taken by the US administration against South Africa without the correct facts as unfortunate.

Steenhuisen was among the economic cluster ministers who were answering oral questions in the National Assembly in Parliament.

He was responding in his capacity as the minister regarding his take about the trade diplomatic issues with the US since the visit of AfriForum and its partners.

“So, any organisation whether its AfriForum or any political organisation or whether it’s an NGO, it is free to travel anywhere they want in the world and to conduct themselves the way they feel they should conduct themselves. I don’t think anybody should stop them from doing so. But I do think that when we share information about South Africa, we should make every effort to make sure our international partners have a full understanding of what the real facts are in South Africa.”

Meanwhile, local stocks sank deeper into the red as investors tried to make sense of the US tariff announcement.

On the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, losses were spread right across the different sectors, with the banks being the biggest losers.

The overall market shed over 3 percent in line with lower global stocks. The rand has also extended its losses, trading at almost R19 to the US dollar.