Mexico is increasing tariffs and creating new tariff schedule provisions for iron and steel products, according to a notice in the Sept. 20 Diario Oficial. The country is creating 82 new tariff subheadings to identify different types of iron and steel, modifying 25 subheadings and eliminating 21, all to improve monitoring required under the agreement to end U.S. Section 232 tariffs on Mexico. Mexico is also increasing tariffs to 15 percent for more than 200 subheadings covering iron and steel products that were previously dutiable at 3 percent to 5 percent, and is modifying the text of 22 other subheadings and increasing the applicable tariff rate to 15 percent, said a Mexican Confederation of Customs Broker Associations (CAAAREM) circular posted by the consultancy AJR Mexico. Rates will be decreased every two years by 5 percent, so duties on these subheadings will fall to 10 percent in 2021 and to 5 percent in 2023 before being eliminated entirely in 2024. Mexico is also increasing tariffs on other tariff subheadings for iron and steel products, and adding iron and steel products to maquiladora and sectoral promotion programs. The changes took effect Sept. 22.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
Rep. Filemon Vela, D-Texas, along with five other Democrats, introduced a companion bill to the bipartisan Senate bill Protecting America's Food and Agriculture Act. H.R. 4482, introduced Sept. 24, instructs CBP to hire 240 more agricultural inspectors a year above the current rate of attrition, until the shortage is resolved. The National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America supports the proposal (see 1907220044). The co-sponsors include Reps. Vicente Gonzalez, D-Texas, Salud Carbajal, D-Calif., Jim Costa, D-Calif., Cindy Axne, D-Iowa, and Agriculture Committee Chairman Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minn.
Several issues related to detention and demurrage remain to be addressed as the Federal Maritime Commission moves forward with its recent proposed rule on detention and demurrage practices, said Richard Roche of Mohawk Global Logistics, at the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America’s government affairs conference Sept. 23 in Washington. Key among these are notices of availability for cargo and charges for customs holds, he said.
CBP will eliminate penalties for minor violations of Census Bureau export filing requirements as part of its upcoming electronic export manifest rollout, said Jim Swanson, director of CBP’s Cargo and Security Controls Division.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission is moving into the latter stages of an effort to streamline ACE messaging to CBP and entry filers, said John Blachere, trade specialist at CPSC’s Office of Import Surveillance, at the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America government affairs conference on Sept. 23.
The CBP Base Metals Center of Excellence and Expertise is overseeing a huge increase in the number of Post Summary Correction requests for retroactive application of Section 232 exclusions, agency officials recently told the American Institute for International Steel. "The Base Metals Center PSC workload has increased approximately 1500% from pre Section 232," AIIS said. As a result of that volume, "[w]hen exclusions are claimed retroactively by PSC, some time may be required to process," the trade group said.
The National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America will submit a comment to CBP on the proposed rule (see 1908130031) aimed at tackling the problems of compliance for non-resident importers, according to Mary Jo Muoio, senior vice president, Trade Services and Government Relations, for Geodis USA. Muoio, who was responding to CBP Deputy Commissioner Bob Perez at the NCBFAA Governmental Affairs Conference in Washington Sept. 23, said the rule would have unintended consequences, because self-filers would not have to subject themselves to the same scrutiny.
CBP is preparing for the possibility of another immigration surge at the southern border similar to the one that stretched the agency’s customs resources earlier this year, said Robert Perez, CBP’s deputy commissioner. Perez, speaking at a National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America conference on Sept. 23, highlighted CBP’s response efforts to the initial surge but said the crisis led to “longer wait times” for cargo clearance and diverted a large number of the agency’s resources and officers.
Tomatoes imported from Mexico and sold on consignment can be valued using pricing data from the Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Marketing Service, said CBP in a Sept. 12 ruling. Stein Shostak lawyer Richard Shostak requested the ruling on behalf of the Nogales Customs Brokers Association, the Fresh Produce Association of the Americas and the Texas International Produce Association, CBP said. Currently "almost all of the fresh produce presently being entered at Nogales is imported on consignment," CBP said. "In other words, the produce is not sold until after it is imported into the United States, and thus there is no sale for exportation."