A withhold release order on Chinese polysilicon remains the major concern for the U.S. solar industry, despite recently opened anti-circumvention inquiries that could result in the imposition of antidumping and countervailing duties on solar modules from Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam and CBP’s implementation of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, according to a market research report released by BofA Securities March 29.
CBP posted more documents ahead of the March 31 Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC) meeting:
As CBP works to implement the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, its champion, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., told International Trade Today he's concerned that CBP will not strictly enforce the law, which says that any good with any input from China's Xinjiang region is assumed to contain forced labor.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
A leading voice in the House behind the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act introduced a bipartisan bill that would remove permanent normal trade relations from China and instead would require annual affirmations from the administration that "the Chinese government is making serious and sustained improvement in respecting human rights" in order to retain most-favored-nation tariffs.
After the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative agreed to reinstate 64% of expired Section 301 tariff exclusions (see 2203230070), business interests said it should go further, while the Coalition for a Prosperous America said the decision was wrongheaded.
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The top trade official in the British government and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said they want to do even more trade and investment between the two countries, even as a free-trade agreement is not the end goal. Secretary of State for International Trade Anne-Marie Trevelyan had hoped that the Biden administration would continue the free trade negotiations started during the Trump administration, but that has not happened. Marjorie Chorlins, who leads the U.S.-U.K. Business Council at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, also spoke at the March 21 plenary in Baltimore, saying the business community strongly supports more U.S.-U.K. economic cooperation.
Senators on the Finance Committee agreed that deepening trade ties with countries in Asia is important both for geopolitical and economic reasons, but they disagreed during a March 15 hearing on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework about whether a traditional free-trade agreement is a better approach than the IPEF.
The Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force will hold a public hearing on April 8, DHS said in a notice. The hearing is a requirement of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which also requires consideration of public comments on how to implement the law (see 2201210031, 2203150037 and 2203100044). "The hearing will consider measures that can be taken to trace the origin of goods, offer greater supply chain transparency, and identify third country supply chain routes for goods mined, produced, or manufactured wholly or in part with forced labor in [China], as well as other measures for ensuring that such goods" don't enter the U.S., it said.