CBP announced the trade associations and companies represented on its 90-member task force that is currently developing new customs legislation as part of CBP’s 21st Century Customs Framework, as well as the identities of the 12 participants in the “focus group” that will vet the task force’s recommendations, in two documents released July 19. The task force includes 43 members from the trade community, as well as participants from CBP and other government agencies.
The 21st Century Customs Framework task force is looking at changes to CBP’s entry statute and legal provisions on administrative exemptions that would support a reimagined entry process that could bring unprecedented benefits for both enforcement and trade facilitation, agency officials said, speaking during the CBP’s Virtual Trade Week on July 20.
CBP will “soon” provide more information on who is participating in a task force of industry representatives and government officials developing a new customs legislative framework as part of CBP’s 21st Century Customs Framework, said Garrett Wright, who leads the effort as director of trade modernization at CBP’s Office of Trade.
CBP posted multiple documents ahead of the June 23 Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC) meeting:
The Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC) for CBP will next meet remotely June 23, CBP said in a notice. Comments are due in writing by June 22.
A task force made up of government and industry representatives developing legislative language under CBP's 21st Century Customs Framework effort "have signed nondisclosure agreements," said John Leonard, acting executive assistant commissioner for trade, while speaking during a Foreign Trade Association World Trade Week event May 20. That "limits them to a certain extent," though "communications can happen via associations through members back up to the task force, so it's not going to be completely done in a vacuum." The NDAs were necessary "to make this thing actually be able to function in reality and get stuff done before it becomes law," he said.
Making sure the recent changes to bankruptcy law that affects custom brokers don't expire at the end of the year (see 2012210045) is the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America's top priority, lobbyist Martin Whitmer said during a political update at the NCBFAA conference May 5. The group also is closely watching the 21st Century Customs Framework, renewal of the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill and the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program, ACE funding, forced labor legislation, the infrastructure package and the highway bill. “Trade and freight movement are one of the top topics in D.C. right now,” he said. “Members of Congress want to learn from you.”
CBP is looking into making admissibility decisions earlier on for importers that give the agency more information about their supply chains, Garrett Wright, director of trade modernization at CBP, told an April 22 meeting of the Commerce Department's Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness. The agency is looking at some broad changes to its processes as part of the CBP work on the 21st Century Customs Framework (see 2011120010). The effort's five main “bucket areas” include "updates that improve the timeliness and the quality of data that we receive or is made available to us so we can reengineer our entry processes so we are able to clear lawful trade more quickly,” he said.
CBP is moving away from relying on blockchain for its trade processing "for a number of reasons and moving more toward interoperability," Vincent Annunziato, director of CBP’s business transformation office, told an April 22 meeting of the Commerce Department's Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness. "One of the reasons we are moving into interoperability is not to not invest in blockchain, but to allow private sector, all of you, to invest in the technologies that you would like to use in order to communicate with the government," he said. CBP has been looking into making use of the technology for several years (see 1711080023).
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters: