CBP Expanding Forced Labor Enforcement Staff, Set for Improved Outreach, Tracing Techs

CBP is in the process of setting up a second investigations branch in its forced labor division, putting to use additional forced labor funding budgeted by Congress for 2021, said Therese Randazzo, director of the agency’s forced labor division, during CBP’s Virtual Trade Week on July 21.

The additional resources will mean a doubling of CBP’s forced labor investigative staff, and is set to be implemented by the end of the fiscal year, said Ana Hinojosa, who heads CBP’s Trade Remedy and Law Enforcement Directorate, which incorporates the forced labor division. It will help CBP address current challenges related to forced labor enforcement and be more responsive, as well as complete several initiatives and outreach efforts related to forced labor planned by the agency.

CBP’s current forced labor staff is stretched thin, Randazzo said. Beyond the rapid increase in the issuance of forced labor withhold release orders since the elimination of the consumptive demand exemption in 2016, there has also been an evolution in the complexity of WROs issued by the agency. Instead of focusing on individual entities, recent WROs on the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps and on cotton and tomatoes from Xinjiang apply to affiliated entities and downstream products, respectively. The cotton and tomato WRO alone is equivalent to dozens or hundreds of WROs on individual entities, Randazzo said. Together, the two WROs represent three-quarters of all forced labor detentions in 2021, she said.

One thing CBP is looking into is improved supply chain tracing technologies, Randazzo said. The agency is exploring technological solutions to two of its most significant challenges: the lack of transparency in complex supply chains, and country of origin identification of component goods and materials. Industry input at CBP’s recent Forced Labor Industry Days “improved CBP’s awareness of the innovations that exist,” she said.

CBP is also working on improving its detention notices based on input from the trade community. The agency hopes to provide more feedback to importers when the information provided by the importer is not enough to overcome CBP’s suspicion of forced labor. For example, for shipments detained under the Xinjiang cotton WRO, CBP recognizes that information at the farm level may be difficult for an importer to obtain, but the importer can provide evidence of admissibility by tracing the supply chain back to the baler level.

Though CBP was initially reluctant (see 2007160037), the agency is now considering ways that importers can work with CBP and address forced labor issues they find in their supply chains, Hinojosa said. CBP is looking into prior disclosures and voluntary disclosure provisions to see if there are any adjustments that need to be made so importers can bring forward issues that they come across, she said.

CBP is close to issuing a Frequently Asked Questions document on its recently issued WRO on polysilicon made by Hoshine (see 2106240062), and hopes to get it out by July 23, Hinojosa said. But for WROs in general, CBP does not intend to address exactly what documentation importers should provide to prove their goods are not made with forced labor. That documentation is highly dependent on the supply chain and what the importer is trying to prove, whether the goods do not include components from a company subject to a WRO; the goods do not contain any materials subject to a WRO; or the goods contain both, but nonetheless were not made with forced labor.

For goods that are inadmissible, the spread of forced labor import prohibitions around the world could soon curtail importers’ ability to reexport the goods to other countries. “Many borders are going to close to products made using forced labor,” said Anasuya Syam of the Human Trafficking Legal Center, a non-governmental organization. Canada has already enacted a “Tariff Act-like provision” under USMCA, and Mexico will soon do the same. Other big importing economies like the European Union, the United Kingdom and Australia are also considering restrictions, with concrete legislative proposals pending, Syam said. “No country should be a safe harbor for goods made from forced labor,” she said. “It’s only a matter of time now until the trade community faces multi-country bans on their products because of forced labor."