USDA's Commodity Credit Corporation announced Jan. 4 that Special Import Quota #12 for upland cotton will be established Jan. 11, allowing importation of 6,199,761 kilograms (28,475 bales) of upland cotton, down from 7,207,463 kilograms (33,103 bales) in the previous quota period. The quota will apply to upland cotton purchased not later than April 9, 2024, and entered into the U.S. by July 8, 2024. The quota is equivalent to one week's consumption of cotton by domestic mills at the seasonally adjusted average rate for the September through November 2023 period, the most recent three months for which data is available.
Coalition for a Prosperous America, an organization that has been arguing that de minimis should only apply to gifts and goods brought by consumers as they return from abroad (see 2312140046), wants to kill the Customs Modernization Act of 2023, the bipartisan bill introduced in the Senate that would update CBP authorities in a number of areas (see 2312110048).
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
A listing of recent Commerce Department antidumping and countervailing duty messages posted on CBP's website Jan. 4, along with the case number(s) and CBP message number, is provided below. The messages are available by searching for the listed CBP message number at CBP's ADCVD Search page.
The National Association of Foreign-Trade Zones did a round of lobbying calls last month to tell appropriators that in some ports, CBP isn't accepting applications for new FTZs because they don't have the resources to manage them. That, in turn, delays economic development, they argued. In a news release published Jan. 5, NAFTZ said that during the 14 meetings, they also argued that lack of money is the reason CBP backtracked on allowing goods detained under suspicion of forced labor to be housed in FTZs.
CBP found no substantial evidence that Muller Import Inc. and U.S. Castings Inc. evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on cast iron soil pipe and cast iron soil pipe fittings from China via transshipment through India, the agency announced Dec. 22.
CBP posted to its website an attachment it has been sending along with notices of detention under the Uyghur Forced Labor Detention Act that includes examples of documentation importers may submit to obtain a release, including for several products that only recently have come under CBP scrutiny.
The Federal Maritime Commission is granting ocean carriers special permission to immediately hike rates on containers that are being rerouted around the southern cape of Africa, in response to concerns over possible Houthi rebel attacks on usual routes through the Red Sea.
CBP will on Feb. 15 begin deactivating some Section 232 exclusions when they reach 95% of capacity, addressing concerns in a recent Government Accountability Office report that duties were going unpaid because the agency was letting importers exceed their exclusion limits (see 2307210064).
Ian Saunders began his job as the new secretary general of the World Customs Organization, the organization said Jan. 3. Nominated by CBP, Saunders was elected to the position in June (see 2306260031). He was previously a deputy assistant secretary at the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration.