TradeLane

On January 16 2016, the United States announced that they are lifting certain US sanctions against Iran that are consistent with the announcement of Implementation Day and in compliance with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The United States Department of Treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) released a general guidance document regarding the lifting of US sanctions under the JCPOA.

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.

I used to live in the USA. I spent a year in Corvallis, Oregon when I was ten years old. I remember it as one of the happiest times in my life, except for being confused about my national identity. Most of my elementary school classmates thought that I was from North Korea. This is not surprising since the North Korea nuclear issue had been surfacing at that time during George H. W. Bush’s presidency. North Korea is still a frequent topic on the famous American TV show, Conan, to this day.

I’m from Massachusetts. I grew up with snow and ice. However, I guess I have lost my edge since I have been living in Singapore for the past six years. At the moment, I am in Seoul Korea celebrating the opening of Tradewin Korea and it’s cold…! It is about 25°F (-4°C), which my head tells me is really not that cold but my body tells me differently. My boss (Boston based) says I’ve developed ‘thin blood’ living in the tropics…maybe so.

Last April I wrote a blog post, ‘Springtime in Shanghai’, celebrating the opening of Tradewin China. I thought it would be appropriate to do the same now that we are opening Tradewin Korea! 

The ChAFTA will also open doors for investment projects and create new jobs thus boosting the economy.

The jobs, however, seem to be creating serious concerns amongst Australian labor force. The Australian Union, who was campaigning against ChAFTA, is arguing that the easing of labor market restrictions will inevitably jeopardize Aussie jobs and flood the country with unskilled workers. This is of course is a political debate that continues as I type these words; not for a humble trade consultant to comment on!