Importers will soon see a “more stringent” enforcement environment and more focus on compliance as CBP expands its data collection and the Centers of Excellence and Expertise program matures, said David Forgue, a customs lawyer with Barnes Richardson, at the Georgetown Law Center International Trade Update on March 10. More data and industry expertise will allow CBP to better target importers and discover compliance issues even before the importer has a chance to discover and correct them, he said.
No new lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of Feb. 27 - March 5, nor were any appeals of CIT decisions filed at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit during that week.
Trade groups called for simplification of the tariff schedule and alignment of free trade agreements, in recent comments to the International Trade Commission. The complicated provisions of Chapter 64 create perverse incentives for shoe designers, the Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America (FDRA) said. Misaligned free trade agreements cause importers not to use trade programs, the American Apparel & Footwear Association (AAFA) said. And differences between how countries classify semiconductors creates a compliance burden for semiconductor importers, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) said. The comments were submitted for an annual ITC report on import restraints (see 1610120051).
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of Feb. 20-26:
Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners are not religious or cultural rituals for the purposes of tariff classification, the Court of International Trade said in a decision issued March 1 (here). That being the case, Christmas and Thanksgiving-themed dinnerware imported by WWRD should be classified according to its constituent materials, instead of alongside Seder plates and menorahs in a special duty-free tariff subheading for articles used in specific religious or cultural ritual celebrations, CIT said.
The Environmental Protection Agency will enforce a hard deadline for upcoming Toxic Substances Control Act labeling requirements for formaldehyde emissions in composite wood products, the EPA’s Todd Coleman said during a Feb. 23 webinar. Beginning Dec. 12, 2017, imported composite wood products covered by a recent EPA final rule will have to be labeled as compliant with new formaldehyde emissions requirements (see 1612120022). Prior to that date, EPA will not allow imports of products bearing such labels, though the agency will allow early labeling of composite wood products distributed abroad as long as it is not distributed on U.S. soil, Coleman said.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service is extending the period for comments on proposed changes to nutrition labeling requirements for meat and poultry products, it said (here). The Jan. 19 proposed rule (see 1701190019), which would also apply to catfish, would align FSIS nutrition labels with the new labeling scheme adopted by the Food and Drug Administration in May (see 1605200021). FSIS would revise the information required on nutrition facts labels, adopt FDA's new format with larger type for calorie and serving information, and adopt new reference values for pregnant and lactating women and children under age 4. Single serving size and dual column labeling would be required for certain containers, and recordkeeping required for some nutrients. Comments are now due April 19.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of Feb. 13-19:
An apparel importer’s purported buying agent commissions, a cash advance to its supplier and indirect payments for fabric development and inspection fees should all have been included in the transaction value of the apparel for valuation purposes, CBP said in a recent ruling. In HQ H271308 (here), issued Nov. 30, CBP headquarters found Key Apparel’s agent was not bona fide, partly because its payments to the agent were based on the apparel’s resale price rather than the price paid to the apparel supplier. CBP also found Key did not provide enough evidence that the indirect payments to its suppliers were not tied to the sale of the apparel.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of Feb. 6-12: