CBP agriculture specialists will accept electronic submissions of all import documents, including veterinary health certificates, via the ACE Document Image System (DIS) for some products, CBP New York said in an informational pipeline dated March 23. The new policy, meant to address concerns related to the COVID-19 pandemic, will remain in effect through May 16, CBP New York said.
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The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service will allow imports of jujube fruit from China, it said in a notice. Importation will be subject to conditions including an import permit, phytosanitary certificate from the Chinese government, registration of production locations and packinghouses, and port of entry inspections, as well as treatment for pests if grown or packed south of the 33rd parallel, among other things. The notice takes effect March 12.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service should allow for a “soft enforcement” period following its deadline for ACE filing of APHIS Core partner government agency (PGA) data in August, the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America said in comments to the agency dated March 4. While the Aug. 3 deadline proposed by the agency allows enough time for brokers to get ready for mandatory filing (see 2001310042), some flexibility in implementation would “guard against unwelcome disruptions in trade,” the NCBFAA said.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Feb. 24-28 in case they were missed.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is finalizing a new de minimis exemption from Lacey Act declaration requirements for importers. Under the final rule, importers will not have to submit declarations for products with minimal amounts of plant material, with limitations also set on the total amount of plant material on an entry line. The final rule takes effect April 1.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is finalizing new standards that would allow it to recognize “compartments” for animal disease status in foreign countries, it said in a notice. The final rule is the same as the proposed rule (see 1904030022), it said. “Our process will include information requirements for evaluating the animal health status of a compartment for which a market access request has been submitted,” APHIS said. “Under this rule, we will perform a risk assessment to evaluate the animal health status of a compartment. If after conducting the evaluation, we deem the risk of importing animals or animal products from that compartment to be acceptable, we will publish a Federal Register notice announcing the availability of the risk documentation for public review and comment.” The rule will take effect on March 30.
New regulations setting a new de minimis exemption from Lacey Act declaration requirements for importers is now set for publication, after the Office of Management and Budget approved its review of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service final rule. As proposed by APHIS in July 2018 (see 1807060013), importers would not have to submit declarations for products with minimal amounts of plant material, with thresholds based on either weight or volume at either the product or entry line level. OMB completed its approval “consistent with change,” which means the final rule can be published, albeit with some substantive changes required by OMB.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Jan. 27-31 in case they were missed.