Brazil added another 147 items to its list of foreign capital, information technology and telecommunications goods exempt from import tariffs under its Ex-Tarifario regime, according to an Oct. 3 report from the Hong Kong Trade Development Council. Tariffs will be reduced to zero, from 16 percent or 14 percent, the report said, and many of the additional goods “could potentially be imported” from China and Hong Kong. The additions include 136 capital goods and 11 IT and telecom goods and will be exempt from tariffs through Dec. 31, 2021, the HKTDC said. Brazil added 281 products to its Ex-Tarifario regime in August (see 1908120042).

Argentina expanded its authorized economic operator program to include customs brokers, customs agents and “road transport shippers linked to foreign trade,” according to an Oct. 3 report from the Hong Kong Trade Development Council. To participate in the AEO program, the brokers, agents and shippers must meet certain tax compliance and “commercial registration systems” requirements,” the report said. The change is part of Argentina’s effort to align its AEO program with the World Customs Organization's parameters, the HKTDC said.

Laos removed inspection checkpoints along main roads from its largest province to “expedite the movement of freight transport,” according to an Oct. 3 report from the Hong Kong Trade Development Council. The checkpoints, removed from the Savannakhet province, were slowing down cargo movement, serving as “an additional layer of red tape” and were used by local officials to impose “informal fees” on freight companies, businesses told the Laos government, HKTDC said. Although “general inspections” have been eliminated, certain Laotian officials can still inspect freight transport vehicles if they suspect illegal activity, the report said.

Japan’s legislature will review the U.S.-Japan trade agreement today, Japan’s foreign minister told Nikkei, adding that Japan has “no objections” to the deal taking effect Jan. 1, 2020.

The FCPA Blog released its Foreign Corrupt Practices Act enforcement report for the third quarter of 2019, featuring seven enforcement penalties worth close to $78.5 million. The penalties include two civil settlements, two indictments, one prison sentence and another awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty, according to the report. There were also three corporate declinations from the Justice Department. The penalty total for 2019’s third quarter was less than for the third quarter in each of 2018 and 2017, which added up to $1.97 billion and about $1 billion, respectively.

Uncertainty over trade policy and African swine fever continue to overtake agricultural markets, causing “volatility across the industry,” CoBank said in its quarterly U.S. rural economic review, released this month. But there were two bright spots for U.S. exporters, CoBank said: the renewed Chinese purchases of U.S. agricultural products and the initial trade agreement between the U.S. and Japan, which will allow the U.S. ag industry to regain competitiveness in a “key export destination.”

U.S. sanctions on two large shipping companies last month disrupted the tanker market, forcing oil traders to cancel bookings and causing rates to spike as they searched for other ships, according to a September post from Clyde & Co.

Sanctions officials are sometimes unable to judge the effectiveness of the Trump administration's sanctions regimes, the Government Accountability Office said, pointing to the difficulty of tracing the effects of sanctions and the administration's constantly changing foreign policy goals. Officials said it is sometimes impossible to determine whether U.S. sanctions are the only or even the “most significant” reason for a foreign country changing its behavior, the report said. They also said U.S. policy goals can change while a sanctions regime is still active, “making it difficult to measure sanctions’ effectiveness in achieving any ultimate policy objective.”

Many things about the U.S.-China trade war have not turned out as experts expected, panelists said at the Washington International Trade Association Oct. 2. Chad Bown, a trade economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and former White House economist, said that 18 months ago, people would have not expected there to be 15 percent to 30 percent tariffs on more than half of Chinese imports, with nearly all the rest slated for tariffs by December, and yet, the economy is doing OK. "Markets haven't panicked," he said. But Bown said he's not that surprised that the country hasn't seen a massive effect from the trade war, since the tariffs in place the longest were on inputs, and because, compared to the size of the entire economy, "we don't actually trade all that much."

In the Oct. 2 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted: