U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said that the trade facilitation agreement that the U.S. and Brazil signed Oct. 19 is very similar to the USMCA trade facilitation chapter, and that traders should expect more incremental progress in coming months. “There’s a lot more that needs to be done,” Lighthizer said during a U.S. Chamber of Commerce program Oct. 20. “We have ongoing negotiations on ethanol. Brazilians like to talk about sugar. There’s a variety of things in the agriculture area.”
Tariff classification rulings
More companies are seeking drawback payments as the economic slowdown has increased the importance of cash on hand, CBP officials and industry executives said during the American Association of Exporters and Importers virtual conference Aug. 20. “In general, I would say COVID's had a major impact on our businesses and it's also made our company even more focused on getting cash in the door,” said Kathleen Palma, senior executive for international trade compliance at GE. “One of the levers that our leadership has been looking at has been drawback.” At the same time, Palma expects that because the company is bringing in fewer shipments, that will be reflected in fewer drawback claims going forward.
A “skinny deal” to be completed before the United Kingdom crashes out of the European Union on Dec. 31 is seen as unlikely, but experts differ slightly on what that means for business. Robert Hardy, commercial director of Oakland Invicta Ltd., and founder of a Brexit-focused customs consultancy, said that even if there was a “soft Brexit,” all that would do is delay the pain, because presumably the deadline would be pushed out to fill in the details. “Customs paperwork exists in all scenarios. Actually, in a no-deal scenario, there’s less paperwork,” he said, because you don't have to account for rules of origin. “There’s more duty, but I don’t pay the duty, I do the paperwork,” he quipped.
Some new provisions within the USMCA seem to make claims of U.S. goods returned under Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 9801 for U.S. origin goods much less important than was the case under NAFTA. Kevin Riddell, director-trade and regulatory compliance at Tremco Group in Canada, highlighted the changes, which allow for USMCA claims on U.S. origin goods, in a recent LinkedIn post. While Riddell said he hadn't tried to enter U.S. goods under the new USMCA provisions, a CBP spokesperson confirmed that “a USMCA claim may be made on goods of U.S. origin, provided it satisfies its applicable rule of origin and all other requirements of the Agreement have been met.”
The High Court of Australia ruled against the country’s customs agency when it said gummy vitamins are deemed “medicaments” and are not subject to import duties, according to a Feb. 7 KPMG post. The ruling, made Feb. 5, stemmed from a dispute over the correct customs classification of the vitamin gummies, which were imported into Australia and classified as “medicaments” by the importer. The country’s customs authority argued that the imports were “sugar confectionary” or “other food preparations,” which are subject to duties worth about 5 percent of the customs value.
The European Union-Singapore free trade agreement contains several significant rules of origin that may impact companies’ ability to benefit from the deal, KPMG said in a Nov. 13 post. The deal, which will take effect Nov. 21, is expected to eliminate Singapore tariffs on EU goods and remove all EU tariffs within a few years (see 1911080069). The deal’s rules of origin will be used to determine whether goods are eligible for preferential treatment and are product-specific, meaning the criteria that determines whether an item qualifies for a preferential tariff varies from product to product, KPMG said.
In the Oct. 22-23 editions of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:
In the Sept. 11 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:
In the April 16 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:
China overhauled its e-commerce regulations in recent months, upping its de minimis level and adding new responsibilities for logistics providers and foreign suppliers, and also adopted new regulations on foreign medical device facility inspections. Meanwhile, China's General Administration of Customs has recently set new requirements for bonded zones and set lower value-added tax rates for some products. The following is an update on recent customs and trade-related actions by China: