CBP’s cargo operations remain mostly unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic, CBP said on a call held March 13, according to an emailed update from the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America. There are no additional screening requirements for cargo because medical professionals have advised that COVID-19 is transmitted by people not cargo, CBP said on the call, according to the American Association of Exporters and Importers. “If CBP receives different guidance, they will relay that information immediately,” CBP said, as relayed by the NCBFAA.
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CBP is in the very early stages of considering whether to expand the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism program to foreign-trade zones, said Lydia Jackson, FTZ program manager in the CBP Office of Cargo and Conveyance Security. She spoke Feb. 11 during the National Association of Foreign-Trade Zones legislative summit. The question has been approached before by CBP, and the agency previously found the problem to be that the FTZ importer is “not always the same entity, etc., etc.,” she said.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
CBP recently uploaded the final versions of new Minimum Security Criteria for the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism program, which includes some additional criteria since the previous version was posted in May, the agency said in a notice. The main change between the versions “is the addition of two new criteria that apply to all entities: the first one is that members must have a code of conduct in place (ID Number 11.5), and the second is that members must initiate their own internal investigation of a security breach as soon as they are aware of the incident (ID Number 7.37),” CBP said.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Dec. 2-6 in case they were missed.
Recently proposed additional Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism Minimum Security Criteria for ocean carriers beyond the previously planned changes for 2020 are raising some concern, said Michael Young, vice president of Business Process and System at shipping company OOCL, during the Dec. 4 Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee meeting. Young, who is on the COAC, said during the meeting that there were seven minimum security criteria recently added for ocean carriers. CBP “did propose additional MSC in light of the recent smuggling issues that happened” as a way “to address the situation that occurred in those high-profile cases,” Young said in an email after the meeting. He declined to go into specifics because the proposal is still under discussion.
CBP is hoping to begin its risk-based bonding program for new importers of merchandise subject to antidumping and countervailing duties in March 2020, but there still remain some thorny issues that need to be ironed out. The agency is still working on ACE enhancements, including identifiers and queries for new importers, said Lisa Gelsomino, of Avalon Risk Management, at the Dec. 4 meeting of the Commercial Customs Operations Advisory Committee (COAC).
CBP opened the first Eagle Pass, Texas, Port of Entry Free And Secure Trade lane at the Camino Real International Bridge, CBP said in a news release. “The FAST lane will enable U.S. Customs and Border Protection to offer expedited clearance to those carriers and importers that have made a commitment to increase the security of their supply chain and who have enrolled in the Customs-Trade Partnership against Terrorism (C-TPAT) and utilize FAST approved commercial drivers to import qualifying goods," CBP said. "The creation of a designated FAST lane is the result of a cooperative effort among many federal, state, and provincial government entities on both sides of the U.S./Mexico border and is expected to ensure the security of imported merchandise while enhancing the economic prosperity of both countries."
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published its fall 2019 regulatory agenda for CBP. The only new trade-related rulemaking included is a proposed requirement for the U.S. Postal Service to transmit advance electronic information to CBP for international mail shipments. That rule is a result of the STOP Act, or Synthetics Trafficking and Overdose Prevention Act, signed by President Donald Trump in October 2018 (see 1810240052). CBP is targeting December to issue an interim final rule, it said.
CBP plans to publish its new Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (CTPAT) minimum security criteria in the Federal Register sometime after Jan. 1, said Mark Mahoney, a CBP supervisory supply chain specialist, at the Automotive Industry Action Group Customs Town Hall on Nov. 7. CBP programmers are currently at work making the necessary updates to the CTPAT portal, but program participants won’t have to update their security profiles immediately after the new security criteria are in effect, Mahoney said. Participants will have until their next annual review to update their profiles, though they still will need to comply with the new minimum security criteria if they have a validation prior to that, he said. CBP has said that it will take a phased approach to enforcement of the new criteria (see 1810040027).