You may have missed it but on February 24, 2016, H.R. 644 became public law. What is H.R. 644 you ask? It is the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015.
Great. More rules. And largely with a focus on CBP, ICE and the GAO. Snooze.
But for importers there really is some awesome news!
Topics: Export Consulting, Import Consulting, HS Classification
On April 5, 2016, the Ministry of Commerce and the General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China released a joint announcement (No. 11 of 2016), which published a list of products that are embargoed in trade with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).
It was alleged in the announcement that the embargoes are based on the relevant resolutions enacted by United Nations Security Council and the Foreign Trade Law of P. R. China.
Topics: Asia
On March 26, 2016, China’s General Administration of Customs (GAC) announced a revision of the import and export declaration forms (GAC Announcement, No. 20 of 2016).
The revision has accommodated and consolidated all the legislative changes made by Customs, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Commerce, and National Reform and Development Commission etc. ever since 2008, which are relevant to, or have impact on, import and export declaration process. Considering the number of fields that have been changed or added, the revision is unprecedented in past decades.
Topics: Asia
So does the expression, “don’t blink or you’ll miss it,” ring true with anyone? Like your daughter was two, you blinked, and now she’s a freshman in high school? That would be me! That is so not the case with the reconciliation prototype. I have been blinking for almost 18 years and for the most part, the prototype remains largely unchanged.
So, I don’t blame those of you that haven’t reviewed the January 13, 2016 draft release of the Reconciliation Entry Summary Create/Update ACE ABI CATAIR document. It’s easy to miss things you aren’t expecting or looking for. If you are not familiar with the CATAIR, think CFR’s for programmers. I know, yawn.
Topics: Reconciliation
Recently I assisted a client with a particularly difficult and rarely used provision of the NAFTA agreement. It involved a tariff shift rule and list of exceptions that, when coupled with a specific production process, became problematic.
Prior to contacting Tradewin, the client had a Free Trade ‘expert’ look at the provision of NAFTA and the challenge they were facing. The ‘expert’ came to a very detailed and long winded way of creating massive amounts of work for the client. While the analysis was technically correct for the issue, ultimately it did not fit the bill for the client.
When you’re dealing with something as complicated as a Free Trade agreement you want the quickest, easiest, and most compliant solution. A company needs to have a level of confidence in whoever is performing the task. It’s necessary to know you have the right kind of expert who has actual experience with Free Trade qualification. These issues can and do involve trade secrets, material cost structures, manufacturing process, etc. Companies love “the bottom line” and the faster you get there with the least amount of legal exposure the better.
Topics: Reconciliation, Free Trade Agreements
