As ITDS Makes Progress, Interagency Challenges Remain

While there has been some progress toward an International Trade Data System, the complexity of bringing together a disparate group of governmental bodies with differing statutory requirements continues to present some roadblocks, say government and industry officials. Still, there continues to be significant momentum from President Barack Obama's executive order in February that created a 2016 deadline for finishing ITDS (see 14021928), they said. For instance, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), an agency that is involved in regulating some imports but is far less involved at the border as other agencies, reported some movement on its work with CBP, though its clear there's still much to be done.

The FCC, chosen here somewhat at random due to its less prominent role in trade, exemplifies how the work toward an ITDS is moving forward and some of the difficulties that work involves. The FCC, which regulates the U.S. electromagnetic spectrum used by cellular phones and broadcast television, requires submission of FCC Form 740 (here) for authorized radio services and devices that can cause spectrum interference. Such devices, which include any device that uses internal electrical signals, requires that an importer, ultimate consignee or designated broker declare that the goods meet the FCC's regulations that prevent interference with other devices. There are a total of about 2 million form 740 filings each year, the FCC said in 2012 (here).

The FCC uses the Form 740 information "for enforcement purposes, especially where we believe it would be helpful to identify manufacturers that are illegally importing illegal electronic equipment," said an FCC official in an email. The FCC expects to use the move to automation as a chance to review its data collection processes, said the official. "The transition to ITDS and full electronic data collection provides the Commission the opportunity to review its data collection efforts and we are evaluating what steps we can do to streamline our data collection and avoid some potential duplication with CBP," he said. "At this time we don’t expect any increase in the amount of data that filers would need to submit to CBP when reporting imports of FCC regulated items."

CBP has developed an "onboarding plan" to help support the efforts of other agencies, including the FCC, said Deborah Augustin, acting executive director of CBP's Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) Business Office, in an interview. The plan includes a review of business rules and the impact on policies or regulations, said Augustin. As with all of the 47 agencies involved with ITDS development, the FCC will be "examining the manner in which they are receiving their data," as part of the onboarding plan, said Augustin.

CBP is developing a schedule with the other agencies, including the FCC, for pilot programs to test the agencies' various states of readiness for the electronic submission of import data through ACE, said Augustin. For now, the FCC's piloting will involve simply automating the information collection in place, she said. The Consumer Product Safety Commission recently said it would run such a pilot (see 1411100043) in ACE, which is the underlying system that will eventually expand to become ITDS.

Despite the collaborative efforts, the FCC and CBP have not yet been able agree to a memorandum of understanding, necessary for federal privacy protections. The MOUs have been a roadblock for CBP's work on ITDS with a number of agencies, though there's been more progress recently (see 14012923). Both agencies are actively negotiating the agreement, said the FCC official.

CPSC a Model Agency

The CPSC may serve as a model for agencies moving toward ITDS that have little or no existing automation, said Cindy Allen, who previously ran the ACE Business Office at CBP and is now a vice president with DHL Global Forwarding. The CPSC, spurred by some new statutory requirements, came to CBP for help in developing automation, she said. Through an interagency portal into CBP's system, CPSC looked at the real-time data and developed a protocol as to "what happens if there is a CPSC hold," said Allen. As a small agency tasked with enforcing some big new requirements, CPSC authorized CBP to take action in some cases, after which they began a discussion with industry on its role to prevent CPSC holds, Allen said. The FCC would do well to "look at the CPSC pattern of events and say, 'How can we learn from what they have already gone through,'" said Allen.

The first question for each agency involved in ITDS is assessing what level of enforcement authority it has, she said. At one end are the "handful" of agencies that have the authority to hold goods from entering U.S. commerce at all or can prevent distribution in the market after release by CBP, she said. At the other end, are the agencies that "just want the data" to enforce industry standards, said Allen. The FCC's work toward ITDS will include a useful review of exactly how critical the Form 740 is and whether that information is really needed at time of importation, she said. The agency can then consider how it could enforce the requirements more effectively while reducing the burden on the industry, said Allen. For instance, maybe "the manufacturers could file with FCC directly" rather than requiring the information at the time of importation, she said.