Trade participants in the 21st Century Customs Framework “focus group” are set to meet with CBP and other government officials Oct. 17 and 18 to discuss a series of proposed statutory changes developed over recent weeks that aim to incorporate facilitation measures into upcoming customs modernization legislation.
The 75 amendments that will be voted on as a package with the Senate's National Defense Authorization Act include the INFORM Consumers Act, a piece of legislation that shifts more responsibility to online marketplaces to root out counterfeit goods.
International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
The Department of Labor is requesting comments to inform development of the government’s 2014 edition of the List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor and possible updates to the List of Products Produced by Forced or Indentured Child Labor, as needed, DOL said Oct. 4. DOL is requesting commenters provide information to its Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor and Human Trafficking by Dec. 16. Further, DOL also seeks comments to inform the next edition of the Worst Forms of Child Labor report, an annual review that fulfills a statutory mandate tasking the labor secretary with reporting findings with regard to Generalized System of Preferences countries’ implementation of international commitments to eliminate the “worst forms of child labor,” DOL said.
Two House Republicans, including the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, wrote to the CBP commissioner to ask him to explain how CBP screens products containing Chinese critical minerals, and to detail "the methodologies used to gather intelligence about forced labor in critical mineral supply chains and whether you believe these methodologies are sufficient?"
International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
More than a dozen amendments involving trade have been proposed for the National Defense Authorization Act, a bill the Senate passes every year, and is expected to take up in a lame-duck session after the November election.
CBP has yet to release a single shipment detained under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act since the law took effect in June, a CBP official recently told online news and commentary site The Dispatch in an interview. Eric Choy, acting executive director of CBP’s Trade Remedy Law Enforcement Directorate, said the agency has yet to receive a request for UFLPA exception for goods from or connected to China’s Xinjiang region, though companies have attempted to demonstrate that detained goods are not from or tied to Xinjiang.
The Department of Labor's annual report on forced labor and child labor describes a global problem, from garments in Bangladesh, Brazil, Vietnam and Malaysia to tea and thread in India to gold from Venezuela, in addition to the sectors already associated with withhold release orders.
The Coalition for a Prosperous America announced that it had asked CBP to investigate Chinese distribution company Shein for violating the prohibition on the import of goods made with forced labor.