The Commerce Department's Office of Textiles and Apparel (OTEXA) has issued its Major Shippers Textiles and Apparel Report, which contains selected general import statistics by date of import from the Census Bureau through June 30, 2004 by country and category (including merged and part category).

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has announced that it will be conducting a public meeting on September 14, 2004 in order to receive comments concerning a petition (CP 02-1) it received in November 2001 requesting that the CPSC adopt American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) F-400 as a mandatory standard for cigarette lighters.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has posted a notice to its Web site stating that effective August 20, 2004, certain wall hangings of wool or fine animal hair, not knitted or crocheted (HTS 6304.99.10) and certain pillow covers of wool or fine animal hair (HTS 6304.99.40) that are entered or withdrawn from warehouse, for consumption on or after August 20, 2004 are eligible for Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) duty-free treatment provided that the proper GSP requirements are met.

The Bureau of Census (Census) has posted to its Web site the July 2004 edition of its AES Newsletter. Highlights of the articles in Census' July 2004 newsletter include:

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has issued its final results of the antidumping (AD) duty administrative review of certain welded carbon steel pipe and tube from Turkey for the review period of May 1, 2002 through April 30, 2003.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has updated its Web site to announce that the ports of Baltimore, MD and Boston, MA are now participating in its Pilot Bond Centralization Program for Type 1 Importer continuous transaction bonds as of August 16, 2004.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has posted to its Web site a revised "Joint FDA-CBP Plan for Increasing Integration and Assessing the Coordination of Prior Notice (PN) Timeframes" (FDA/CBP Joint Plan).

Consular Information Sheets are available for every country of the world and include a variety of information. The following have been issued since BP's most recent update:

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has amended its initiation and its preliminary results of the antidumping (AD) duty administrative review of certain softwood lumber products from Canada for the review period of May 22, 2002 through April 30, 2003 in order to add 22 companies that were inadvertently omitted from the initiation notice.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued a press release announcing the appointment of Michael C. Mullen as Director of the Office of Trade Relations. According to the press release, Mullen will serve as the liaison between the international trading community and senior CBP managers, and will be responsible for policy review and planning, and assisting the Commissioner on outreach to the international trade community on supply chain security and trade facilitation issues. (CBP press release, dated 08/12/04, available at http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/newsroom/press_releases/08122004_2.xml.)