The Canada Border Services Agency recently updated its list of tariff classification verification priorities. "All goods on the list for a verification of tariff classification have been on previous verification lists," according to a July 26 blog post from Farrow. "However, for Parts of Machines and Mechanical Appliances and Other Chemical Products, the verification priority was released in December 2018 and results are not yet available."

Thailand is extending a program that allows companies to voluntarily disclose and correct unintentional underpayments of customs duties and be eligible for penalty exemptions, according to a July 26 KPMG report. The program, extended until April 30, 2020, will give companies that disclose underpayments an “exemption from customs penalties” and reduce their monthly customs surcharge rate, KPMG said. Thailand will reduce the surcharges from 1 percent to .25 percent if the disclosure is made within one year after the importation, to .50 percent if the disclosure is made within two years, and to .75-percent if the disclosure is made within three years, the report said. The exemption will not impact companies’ value-added tax surcharges and penalties, the report said. Businesses may be ineligible for the program if they are “subject to a customs post-clearance audit” or are being investigated for customs violations, according to the report.

Guangzhou Customs in China will only accept digital versions of the “Customs Broker Power of Attorney Agreement” starting Aug. 1, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council said in a July 23 report. The electronic version must be signed by the “customs declaration enterprise” and the “consignor (or consignee) of the imported/exported goods,” the report said. Guangzhou will then require it to be submitted through the region’s “customs clearance system,” the report said.

China will impose antidumping duties on certain stainless steel products imported from the European Union, Japan, South Korea and Indonesia, the country’s Ministry of Commerce announced in a July 23 press release. China said it is being “substantially damaged” by dumped imports of “stainless steel billet and hot-rolled stainless steel plate/coil” originating in the EU and the three other countries, and will impose antidumping duties ranging from 18.1 percent to 103.1 percent on these products. The duty rates will be in effect for five years, starting July 23, China said. The ruling stems from an investigation China began on July 23, 2018, the ministry said.

China’s Ministry of Commerce is conducting an antidumping investigation on imports of “N-propanol” originating in the U.S., the ministry said in a July 24 press release. The ministry said its investigation will include “n-Propylalcohol, 1-Propanol, 1-Propyl alcohol, Propan-1-ol, Ethylcarbinol or 1-Hydroxypropane.” China said it expects to complete its investigation before July 23, 2020.

House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., who led a trip to Mexico with nine other House members last week, said that everyone came away impressed with Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. Blumenauer said that in his opinion, the entire Mexican Cabinet is clearly committed to changing labor laws in Mexico so that its workers can be better paid. "Lots of money was made [from NAFTA], but workers in the United States, workers in Mexico, are no better off in inflation-adjusted terms," he said.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed a bill on July 25 that would sanction people who are blocking access to Yemeni ports, supporting the Houthi movement in Yemen or were involved in the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the committee said in a July 25 press release. The bill specifically mentions those “hindering the efforts” of the United Nations and other organizations trying to provide humanitarian relief in Yemen and would sanction companies that sell defense-related items or services to the Houthi movement in Yemen. The bill, titled the Saudi Arabia Accountability and Yemen Act of 2019, asks the president to sanction those involved in the Yemen conflict under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and sanction those involved in the Khashoggi murder, including “any official of the government of Saudi Arabia,” under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act.

Five years of data exclusivity for biologics, an end to panel blocking and undefined "mechanisms and resources" to monitor and enforce labor and environmental laws in Mexico are the core of what the House Democrats have asked the Trump administration to change in its NAFTA rewrite. The House Democrats' working group revealed more of what it is asking for in a report sent to the Speaker's office and released publicly July 26. In that report, they wrote, "It is time for the administration to present its proposals and to show its commitment to passing the new NAFTA... ."

The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control issued an amended general license on July 26 that authorizes certain transactions with Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A., Venezuela's state-run oil company. General License 8B, replacing General License 8A, authorizes certain transactions made before July 26 that are necessary to maintain agreements with Venezuela. The license authorizes the transactions for Chevron Corp., Halliburton, Schlumberger Ltd., Baker Hughes and Weatherford International, the license says. The transactions are authorized until Oct. 25.

U.S.-China trade talks broke down over disagreements about the deal’s enforcement mechanism, said Michael Pillsbury, the director for Chinese strategy at the Hudson Institute. And as negotiations are expected to restart, Pillsbury said there is no guarantee a deal will be struck.