Brian Feito

The Commerce Department will consider imposing antidumping and countervailing duties on imports of aluminum foil from South Korea and Thailand, according to a pre-publication notice released by the agency announcing the beginning of anti-circumvention inquiries covering the two countries.

The Commerce Department on July 1 issued a proposed rule to implement the 24-month grace period announced by presidential proclamation in June (see 2206060014) for imports potentially subject to antidumping and countervailing duties on solar cells from Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. As announced in the proclamation, the proposal would exempt solar cells subject to the inquiries from AD/CV duties until June 6, 2024.

CBP should not require “comprehensive supply chain mapping” as part of its requirements for the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism forced labor component, and should update the requirements so that mapping is done via a risk-based approach, said Kerry Novak, who sits on the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee’s Secure Trade Lanes Subcommittee, in recommendations she read at the COAC’s June 29 meeting.

FDA has issued its Enforcement Report for June 29, listing the status of recalls and field corrections for food, cosmetics, tobacco products, drugs, biologics and devices. The report covers both domestic and foreign firms.

The Treasury Department published its fall 2022 regulatory agenda for CBP. The only new mention of any regulations is a return to the agenda for a final rule that would "create a procedure for the disclosure of information otherwise protected by the Trade Secrets Act to a trademark owner when merchandise bearing suspected counterfeit trademarks has been voluntarily abandoned." CBP issued the underlying proposal in 2019 (see 1908260040), and the final rule had been on Treasury's regulatory agenda for 2020 and spring of 2021 before moving to the long-term actions category in the most recent agenda.

Final recommendations of the 21st Century Customs Framework Modernization task force include mandatory partner government agency trusted trader programs under the CTPAT framework and authorization to reduce the merchandise processing fee (MPF) for CTPAT members, among other things, according to a document released in advance of a vote on the recommendations at the June 29 meeting of the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee.

FDA has issued its Enforcement Report for June 22, listing the status of recalls and field corrections for food, cosmetics, tobacco products, drugs, biologics and devices. The report covers both domestic and foreign firms.

FORT LAUDERDALE -- A recent update to internal CBP guidance on prior disclosures significantly shortens the time frame importers and brokers have to gather information on potential violations by making it more difficult to request extensions for more time to perfect the disclosure, customs lawyer Jennifer Diaz of Diaz Trade Law said during a recent panel discussion.

FDA has issued its Enforcement Report for June 15, listing the status of recalls and field corrections for food, cosmetics, tobacco products, drugs, biologics and devices. The report covers both domestic and foreign firms.

FORT LAUDERDALE -- Delays drawback filers are seeing in claims processing are related to a variety of factors, including a reorganization of CBP’s drawback staff and understaffing at certain key drawback centers, but importers can follow certain best practices to speed the process along, CBP officials and drawback experts said during a panel discussion June 15.