CBP Has Halted its Detention/Testing of Sock Importations from 22 Countries
Broker Power has previously reported that effective from February 2, 2004 through April 30, 2004, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) would detain and request production documents for, or send to a laboratory for testing, importations of socks from at most 22 targeted countries.
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CBP began this program due to concern about fraudulent origin claims for both China and Pakistan origin socks. It was believed that socks that actually originated in China or Pakistan were illegally circumventing the quota and visa requirements imposed by the U.S. on China and Pakistan origin socks, by falsely documenting the socks as being from one of the 22 targeted countries. There was also concern regarding the fiber content claims and or intellectual property issues (IPR) for imported socks. (See ITT's 02/19/04 news, 04021910, for most recent BP summary of CBP's sock detention and testing program.)
However, several weeks ago, CBP halted this special detention/testing program for socks.
According to sources, the program terminated ahead of schedule because, among other reasons, CBP has enough data to analyze, with detentions of over $18 million worth of sock shipments occurring during the program's time period. CBP's final report on this sock detention/testing program is currently being consolidated.
BP Notes
- CBP sources add that as this special sock program is terminated, any new detentions or testing of socks for fiber content or Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) violations, etc. would not be part of the program that began on February 2, 2004.
- CBP sources also state that they still plan to launch a document accuracy exam of certain knit-to-shape garments claiming a country of origin other than China, whose entry package claims their panels were knit-to-shape in a country other than China, and then sent to China to be linked and looped. CBP is concerned that what is actually occurring is quota and visa circumvention, with both the knitting-to-shape and linking and looping occurring in China (without claiming China as the country of origin.)
In addition, CBP still plans to launch a "document accuracy test" of non-quota (entry type '01') textiles and apparel. Sources state that this test would be phased-in, and not implemented all at once, adding that the 'knit-to-shape' test could overlap the document accuracy test in terms of the shipments targeted.
(See ITT's Online Archives or 03/10/04 news, 04031015, for BP summary on CBP's upcoming launch of a document exam of certain knit-to-shape garments. See ITT's Online Archives or 02/27/04 news, 04022705, for BP summary of most recent notice on CBP's upcoming 'document accuracy test' of non-quota textiles and apparel.)