Forced Labor

RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. -- CBP is considering offering trusted trader benefits to those in the e-commerce world as a way to improve compliance, said John Leonard, executive director-trade policy and programs at CBP, during a May 2 panel discussion at the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America's annual conference. The hope is to "incentivize all these new actors in this space to improve the platforms and marketplaces, etc., to be more compliant," he said. "Part of that could involve the Trusted Trader program" and the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism program, he said. CBP "is looking at this very closely."

RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. -- Both the government and customs brokers will need to keep agile in light of the fast-moving changes in the world of international trade, said Brenda Smith, executive assistant commissioner-trade at CBP. "The relationship between the government and private sector is very much facilitated by the role of the customs broker," Smith said during a May 2 interview at that National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America's annual conference. "I believe those that do international trade are helped by the knowledge and expertise of customs brokers. I think very often there is a financial function that customs brokers can also perform for the private sector. For CBP, I think, they help educate around requirements and we believe that's a very valuable function."

CBP is working on a regulatory update for its prohibition on imports made by forced labor that it hopes will offer some guidance for compliance, said Brenda Smith, executive assistant commissioner-trade at CBP, while speaking at an April 25 American Apparel and Footwear Association event. That should help to alleviate some, but not all, of the concerns over a change in law that requires CBP to treat goods made by North Koreans as made through forced labor, Smith said. "We also have been looking at our regulations to understand where the gaps are and why we are not as effective as we would like to be," she said.

The Department of Homeland Security released a set of frequently asked questions about the prohibition of products made by North Koreans under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA). That law "reiterates the need for comprehensive due diligence by and on behalf of U.S. companies involved in importing goods," DHS said. Importers "have the responsibility to exercise reasonable care and provide CBP with such information as is necessary to enable CBP to determine if the merchandise may be released from CBP custody," it said.

Participation in the upcoming Commerce Trusted Trader Program for seafood importers could be more costly than the National Marine Fisheries Service purports, trade groups told the agency in recent comments. Contrary to estimates in a January proposed rule on CTTP, compliance plans that would be required for membership in the program “could be highly complicated to develop, and it would require extensive review, clearance, or internal sign-off before submission to NMFS,” the Pacific Seafood Processors Association said.

CBP recently issued a new withhold release order due to suspicions of goods made by forced labor, said CBP's list of such orders. The March 5 order applies to "Toys" from China made by "Huizhou Mink Industrial CO. LTD." The WRO is the first order since September of 2016 (see 1609190019). The lack of WROs was the subject of concern among lawmakers during a hearing with Acting CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan last fall (see 1710240033).

Two class-action lawsuits filed Feb. 23 in Massachusetts federal district court allege Hershey and Mars violated state consumer protection laws by failing to disclose the use of forced and child labor in their supply chains. Danell Tomasella, on behalf of consumers that purchased Hershey and Mars products in Massachusetts during the past four years, alleges those consumers would not have bought Hershey and Mars candy had they known the companies had forced and child labor in their supply chains. Tomasella filed a similar lawsuit against Nestle on Feb. 9.

CBP plans to issue procedures for ACE outages before the end of the month, the agency said in an Outages Working Group report released ahead of the Feb. 28 Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC) meeting in Miami. CBP will "publish the public downtime procedures document by the end of February," it said. Following some COAC recommendations in November, "CBP’s Office of Information and Technology (OIT) has assigned a development team to begin working on the recommended enhancements," it said. "Enhancements to the Dashboard will be implemented throughout calendar year 2018."

CBP’s use of audits and other enforcement tools has grown increasingly coordinated and targeted in the years since passage of the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015, customs consultants from KPMG said during a webinar on Feb. 13. The passage of TFTEA marked the beginning of a “different era” than that launched by the Customs Modernization Act in 1993, with the pendulum “completely swung” from informed compliance to enforcement around priority trade issues identified in the new law, they said.

CBP collected about $34.8 billion in customs duties during fiscal year 2017, the agency said in its trade and travel report for FY 2017. That's a decrease from the $35.2 billion the agency collected in duties during FY 2016. Still, CBP collections in total duties, taxes and other fees during the year were pretty much flat -- about $40.1 billion -- when compared with the previous year. The agency also saw about a five percent increase in cargo containers from FY16, it said. "CBP processed $2.39 trillion in imports in FY2017, equating to 33.2 million entries and more than 28.5 million imported cargo containers at U.S. ports of entry," the agency said.