Brian Feito

The Census Bureau issued AES Broadcast #2012047 as part of a series of monthly educational broadcast messages on the Automated Export System. This month Census is highlighting AES error codes 138 (Port of Unlading Missing) and 649 (QUANTITY 1 CANNOT EXCEED SHIPPING WEIGHT). The broadcast covers the reasons for the these error messages and how to resolve them, as follows:

The Agricultural Marketing Service released the “Ocean Shipping Container Availability Report” for the week of July 18-24, westbound transpacific trade lanes at 18 intermodal locations in the U.S.¹ The weekly report contains data on container availability for westbound transpacific traffic at 18 intermodal locations in the U.S.¹ from the 10 member carriers of the Westbound Transpacific Stabilization Agreement (WTSA)². Although the report is compiled by AMS, it covers container availability for all merchandise, not just agricultural products.

The Bureau of Industry and Security is putting a high priority on disrupting networks that procure parts and components for use in improvised explosive devices (IEDs), said BIS Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement David Mills in the opening remarks for the second day of the Update 2012 Conference on Export Controls and Policy. IED procurement networks mostly trade in electronic components with widespread consumer applications, Mills said. These components can be exported to most countries without a license, but are then being reexported to destinations requiring a license for use in making IEDs, he said. Mills also emphasized BIS’ patience and persistence in export investigations, which can often lead to discovery of other related violations by other companies in a network, and encouraged companies to submit voluntary self disclosures if they have committed violations.

The Court of International Trade sustained the results of a remand redetermination of the final results of the 2005-06 administrative review of ball bearings and parts thereof from France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Singapore, and the United Kingdom (A--427--801, A--428--801, A--475--801, A--588--804, A--559--801, and A--412--801). CIT said the International Trade Administration’s remand redetermination provided adequate explanations to address plaintiff SKF’s concerns that (1) by constructing normal value using the unaffiliated supplier’s costs of production SKF would be unable to adjust its pricing to avoid dumping or decrease its antidumping duty liability because it would lack knowledge of its supplier’s production cost data; and (2) the ITA would apply adverse facts available (AFA) if the unaffiliated supplier failed to provide cost data. The remand was pursuant to a 2011 ruling by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

The Court of International Trade remanded the final determination in the antidumping duty investigation of certain steel grating from China (A-570-947), and ordered the International Trade Administration to (1) redetermine the AD margin for non-individually investigated separate rate recipients Yantai Xinke Steel Structure and Ningbo Haitian International; and (2) determine a separate rate for mandatory respondent Ningbo Jiulong Machinery, which the ITA had determined to be part of the China-wide entity when it applied adverse facts available (AFA). CIT also sustained the ITA’s decision to apply AFA to Jiulong.

A listing of recent antidumping and countervailing duty messages from the International Trade Administration posted to CBP's web site as of July 18, along with the case number(s) and CBP message number, is provided below. The messages are available by searching on the listed CBP message number at http://addcvd.cbp.gov. (CBP occasionally adds backdated messages without otherwise indicating which message was added. ITT will include a message date in parentheses in such cases.)

CBP’s pilot test of electronic export ocean manifests (CBP Form 1302A) using the CBP Document Image System (DIS) will be expanded in mid-August to cover all East Coast ports, as well as the ports of Chicago, Buffalo, and Detroit, said Cynthia Allen of CBP’s ACE Business Office. The pilot, which began March 28, included eight ports in the Southeast and was based at CBP’s Atlanta office. The 18 participating carriers were given the option of entirely electronic filing of their ocean export manifests. “One carrier has calculated savings of $20,000 per month” due to the pilot, said Allen.

The Census Bureau is embarking on a two-year effort to improve the AESDirect interface, said Paul Newman, chief of the Census’ Automated Export System Branch, at the Update 2012 Conference on Export Controls and Policy. The update, a joint effort between the Foreign Trade Division, Census’ Human Factors and Usability Research Team, and the AESDirect Contractor, will result in “improved usability, accessibility, and overall experience for our 47,000 AESDirect filers,” he said.

Information technology is one of the four pillars of Export Control Reform, and “as time continues on, we’ll loom larger,” said Bernie Kritzer, director of the Office of Exporter Services at the Update 2012 Conference on Export Controls and Policy in Washington July 17-19. Kritzer and his colleagues discussed several IT-related initiatives BIS is working on, including address verification in SNAP-R, the transition of the back-end of the licensing process to the interagency USXPORTS platform, and BIS’ eventual hopes for a single submission platform, among other things.

The Department of Defense is concerned about the unintended consequences of licenses for some items and some aspects of Export Control Reform in general, said Rizwan Ramakdawala of the Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA) during a panel on reshaping the control lists at the Bureau of Industry and Security’s Update 2012 Conference on Export Controls and Policy July 17-19 in Washington.