The Fish and Wildlife Service is now requiring two new species to have Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species documentation when being imported into or exported from the U.S., it announced in two public bulletins Feb. 21. The small Reunion swallowtail (Papilio phorbanta) will require CITES documentation starting May 21, and the Palestine viper (Daboia palaestinae), starting May 4, FWS said. Both species were added to the CITES Appendix III species list.

The Fish and Wildlife Service on Feb. 27 released a final rule listing the prostrate milkweed (Asclepias prostrata), a plant species from Texas, as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. New import and export restrictions set by the agency’s final rule take effect March 30.

The International Trade Commission posted Revision 1 to the 2023 Harmonized Tariff Schedule. The update includes a technical correction to the USMCA rules of origin and a minor correction for organic surface-active agents (other than soap). The update also implements the extension through May of exclusions from Section 301 tariffs for 81 medical care products related to COVID-19 (see 2302020065) and implements corrections to descriptions and tariff numbers of two other Section 301 exclusions (see 2302090027). Also, the update removes Western Sahara from country designations and codes in the statistical annexes.

The U.S. goods movement supply chain is in a “much better place” than it was in October and might be undergoing a “pre-pandemic resetting,” said Stephen Lyons, the Transportation Department’s port and supply chain envoy. Lyons, speaking during the Feb. 15 meeting of the Commerce Department’s Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness, attributed a “large degree” of the improvements to weakened demand. “When you look at shipping times, when you look at freight costs, when you look at basic confidence and reliability in systems,” he said, “that has improved dramatically relative to where we were a year ago.”

The U.S. should further regionalize its supply chains to reduce dependency on China and other countries in case of future global trade disruptions, some experts said during a virtual conference this week hosted by the Washington International Trade Association. But at least one expert disagreed, saying global supply chains reduce risks, not exacerbate them.

Major shipping line Mediterranean Shipping Co. must explain to the Federal Maritime Commission by Feb. 28 why it shouldn’t be required to pay a refund to SOFi Paper Products for allegedly violating U.S. shipping regulations, the FMC said Feb. 3. The FMC said MSC never provided “justification” to SOFi stemming from a $1,000 “congestion surcharge” levied against SOFi in July.

The Fish and Wildlife Service is increasing amounts of civil penalties for violations of the laws and regulations it administers, including the Lacey Act and the Endangered Species Act, it said in a final rule. The annual increase for inflation raises penalties about 7.7% over penalty amounts set in 2022, the FWS said.

A lawyer, a lobbyist and a think tank scholar all agreed -- the Section 301 tariff review is unlikely to result in significant changes to the punitive tariffs on most Chinese goods.

The Federal Maritime Commission should dismiss a complaint alleging U.S.-based Omni Logistics violated shipping regulations when it failed to include required information on demurrage invoices for more than 200 containers (see 2212020027), the company told the FMC this week. The complaint by Thompson Pipe Group Pressure, a U.S. supplier of construction equipment and services, “utterly fails to provide any factual detail” about how Omni violated the regulations violations, Omni said. The company also said FMC lacks jurisdiction over the dispute and the complaint alleges violations of the Ocean Shipping Reform Act despite the alleged violations occurring before OSRA was enacted.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is extending a ban on imports of dogs from countries with a high risk for rabies, it said in a notice released Jan. 25. The temporary suspension, which applies to dogs that have been in any high-risk countries in the past six months, had been set to expire Feb. 1, but will now run until July 31, the CDC said. The terms of the temporary suspension are unchanged from those in effect since June (see 2205270042).