Welcome to the second installment in our series on duty-saving strategies. After discussing the utilization of Foreign Trade Zones and Bonded Warehouses in our previous article, we now turn to Section 321, a topic of...more
From Wikipedia: De minimis is a Latin expression meaning “pertaining to minimal things”, normally in the terms de minimis non curat praetor. (“The praetor does not concern himself with trifles”) or de minimis non curat lex...more
Uniformity, or rather the lack thereof, in procedures and practices within U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) Centers of Excellence and Expertise (Centers) is evidently harming compliant companies within the trade...more
On June 13, 2023 a bipartisan group of Senators on the Finance Committee released an open letter requesting input from the trade community on how to modernize U.S. customs laws to ensure the U.S. remains competitive in the...more
Many have viewed corporate commitments to ESG as largely performative measures amidst toothless compliance frameworks. But this has been changing and we expect that change to continue. One example arises out of the “S” in...more
This Primer provides introductory guidance to complying with U.S. forced labor laws for importers, and includes an introductory overview to forced labor laws, U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) authority to enforce...more
Creates A New Forced Labor “Presumption” That Would Prohibit Certain Imports From Entry Into The United States, Among Other Measures, To Address Forced Labor In China - On December 23, 2021, President Biden signed into law...more
The United States Has Taken Major Steps Towards Combating Forced Labor In China, And More Action Is Coming - U.S. enforcement actions and legislative developments in Congress signal a sweeping U.S. effort to take more...more
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on June 24, 2021, issued a Withhold Release Order (WRO) on silica-based products produced by Hoshine Silicon Industry Co. Ltd. (Hoshine) and its subsidiaries. Hoshine makes...more
Under the TFTEA, CBP has taken an increasingly enforcement-minded posture to prevent and penalize the importation of goods produced using forced labor into the United States. On August 13, 2020, CBP announced that it had...more
Report on Supply Chain Compliance 3, no. 11 (May 28, 2020) - U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) issued two withhold release orders in May, one against a seafood vessel and another involving hair products imported...more
Report on Supply Chain Compliance 2, no. 20 (October 24, 2019) - When the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced withhold release orders on Oct. 1, the mainstream media gave it considerable coverage....more
On August 5, 2019, the US Department of the Treasury ("Treasury") announced that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, "under the auspices of President Trump," has determined that China is a "currency manipulator" pursuant to...more
Third-party petitions seeking to ban the importation of goods made with forced labor may affect global supply chains. Petitions are being filed with U.S. Custom and Border Protection seeking to ban the importation into the...more
The Enforce and Protect Act (“EAPA”), signed into law as part of the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015, established procedures for a wide variety of stakeholders to submit allegations of evasion of...more
A Taiwanese-owned, Vanuatu-flagged fishing vessel is the first known enforcement target of its kind by US Customs and Border Protection ("CBP") in its efforts to halt the importation of goods produced with forced labor....more
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS AND TRADE - Agriculture - U.S.: The Administration is seeking authorization to impose about $350 million duties in trade retaliation against Indonesia through the WTO alleging that Indonesia has not...more
Human trafficking is a global problem that is receiving the attention of legislators and law enforcement. Legislative efforts are focused largely on increasing corporate responsibility in the eradication of human trafficking....more
On April 13, 2018, the Treasury Department released its biannual report to Congress on the Macroeconomic and Foreign Exchange Policies of Major Trading Partners of the United States, which declined to formally label China a...more
According to the Acting Commissioner of Customs, Kevin McAleenan, and other senior staff, the ports are open and Customs is coordinating with the over 40 partner government agencies with representatives at the ports. Customs...more
[Warning: The juxtaposition of the jolly old man and forced labor is not to make light of human rights violations but to highlight the hidden evils in supply chains and the potential reputational damage to wholesome brands.] ...more
On November 22, 2017, Apple, Inc. (“Apple”) released a statement confirming reports that its major supplier in China, Foxconn Technology Group (“Foxconn”) has used illegal student labor to assemble the latest version of the...more
“Drawback” is U.S. Customs program that allows importers to get their duty payments refunded by Customs if they export the same or a similar product. There are lots of permutations and it’s quite a bit of “paperwork” to...more
It’s Friday and time for another overview of developments in the field of business and human rights that we’ve been monitoring. This week’s post includes: a new report on human rights litigation in U.S. federal courts; new...more
On June 8, 2017, Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) published a final rule that removes the consumptive-demand exception from its regulations that implement the prohibition on the importation of merchandise that has been...more