The Agricultural Marketing Service released a new publicly available web service for its Livestock Mandatory Reporting (LMR) system. According to AMS, this web service: offers easier access to all historical LMR data; follows commonly accepted technical standards for the automated retrieval of historical data sets by end-users; and allows users to pull large amounts of customized data sets automatically or on-demand. AMS said the Livestock Mandatory Reporting program facilitates price discovery and "provides all market participants, both large and small, with comparable levels of market information for cattle, swine, sheep, beef and lamb meat." The web service is in the tools section at the bottom left of this webpage.
The Foreign Trade Zones Board is issuing the following notices for May 14, 2012:
Related-party trade accounted for 40.5% of total goods trade in 2011, according to a report by the Census Bureau, an absolute increase of 14.6% but a relative decrease from 40.8% to 40.5% as a percentage of total trade. Census said related-party trade accounted for about 48.3% of consumption imports and about 28.9% of total exports. Related-party trade includes trade by U.S. companies with their subsidiaries abroad as well as trade by U.S. subsidiaries of foreign companies with their parent companies.Computer and electronic products, transportation equipment, and chemicals were the top three goods categories for both directions of trade.
Proposed rules on the definition of “specially designed” in the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) and Implementation of Export Control Reform (ECR) were submitted for Office of Management and Budget approval by the Bureau of Industry and Security on May 3 and 4, respectively. The State Department also submitted its “specially designed” proposed rule to OMB on May 4. Additionally, BIS submitted its final rule implementing the changes to the EAR from the Wassenaar Arrangement 2011 Plenary Agreements. OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs has 90 days to review the proposed rules, which may be extended on a one-time basis by 30 days.
The owner of a San Jose, CA, boutique that sells women's clothing and handbags was arrested Tuesday on federal charges for trafficking in counterfeit goods, said Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Hau Phuc Nguyen, 30, is charged with one count of conspiracy to traffic in counterfeit goods and five counts of trafficking in counterfeit goods. According to the indictment, Nguyen conspired with others to import counterfeit Chanel and Louis Vuitton purses from China, Hong Kong and Korea, and sold them at her shop, Cizi’s Handbags.
A New Jersey woman was sentenced to three years of probation, six months of home confinement and a $44,215.50 fine on charges of trafficking in counterfeit M·A·C cosmetics and accessory items, said Immigration and Customs Enforcement. ICE said Lynn Lavigne, 61, of Vineland, NJ, received the cosmetics from a supplier in China, and continued buying and selling the cosmetics after repeated notices by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol that the merchandise was counterfeit and subject to forfeiture.
The Department of Justice seized more than $1.5 million in proceeds from the distribution of counterfeit sports apparel and jerseys, reported Immigration and Customs Enforcement. ICE said the seizures were pursuant to an investigation of Chinese sales of counterfeit profession and sports apparel, in which ICE announced the seizure of a further $896,000 in April 2012.
A listing of recent antidumping and countervailing duty messages from the International Trade Administration posted to U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Web site as of May 11, 2012, 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.
Legislation is urgently needed to extend the African Growth and Opportunity Act’s (AGOA) Third-Country Fabric provision and implement corrections to the Central America -- Dominican Republic -- United States Free Trade Agreement's (CAFTA-DR) textile and apparel provisions, said the U.S. Trade Representative in a fact sheet issued May 8.
Mexico's Diario Oficial of May 10, 2012, lists notices from the Secretary of the Economy as follows: