Monday Morning eBriefing

Now is not the time to slow down on contacting your local Congressional offices to ask them to support the Customs Business Fairness Act (CBFA) (H.R. 4816).

Here is a summary of the latest customs and cross-border trade regulatory updates brought to you by our NCBFAA Customs Counsel firm Sandler, Travis & Rosenberg:

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released its latest Monthly Update Briefing on Blockchain. Learn the latest CBP activities involving Blockchain and future information technologies here.

The NCBFAA Transportation Committee’s Logistics Subcommittee is regularly collecting data on the nation’s rail delays and port congestion that are impacting the supply chain and your business operations. The Logistics Subcommittee has compiled the latest attached data in form of an Excel spreadsheet for your reference. The subcommittee invites members to forward service disruption announcements from the carriers and ports as soon as received to Merit Tremper by email (merit@merittradeservices.com) for inclusion in this Weekly Supply Chain Disruption Roundup series. Meanwhile, NCBFAA members are well aware of the chaos encountered every day in America’s supply chain. Container ports remain congested at levels never experienced. Truck drivers and equipment are in short supply, and railroad networks are tied in knots. The result is increased costs for both imported and exported goods, and that is if they can depart or enter commerce in time. As freight forwarders, NVOCCs, and customs brokers, you are surely getting an earful right now from angry and desperate shippers, and it is not your fault. However, NCBFAA urges you to let your shippers know that you remain in solidarity with them and are doing your utmost using your skills and tools to get them through this the best that you can. NCBFAA, meanwhile, urges you to show your clients that you are aware of the supply chain situation by sending them this Port Congestion Background Paper. You may also download this paper on your letterhead and adjust the text accordingly.

NCBFAA knows that you as our members are doing their best to keep up with their day-to-day businesses under dire supply chain circumstances, and now add on top of all that the recent flurry of U.S. sanctions imposed on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. What do these sanctions mean to your business (our industry)? Well, it can be an awful lot, depending on whether you work with customers that had export or import business with Russia prior to invasion.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on April 23 will deploy the new ACE Forms tool. This enhancement will modernize the CBP Forms 28, 29, 4647, and Docs Required response and management functionality for trade users.

As you heard last week, NCBFAA is launching a brand-new website experience for members on May 9. In the weeks leading up to the grand reveal, we will be sharing updates with all of you, including sneak peeks of some new website features, like the improved Broker/Forwarder Directory.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said its Draft Global Business Identifier (GBI) Evaluative Proof of Concept (EPoC) CATAIR Chapters (GE and GO) for future capabilities is now available. The chapters are in the section “Draft Chapters: Future Capabilities.” Here is the link.

James Fletcher Mooring passed away on April 8 at his Tierra Linda Ranch home surrounded by his family. He was 93.

Customs brokers and freight forwarders with international payment obligations in foreign currency can apply these three tactics to more effectively manage the volatility associated with foreign currency and thereby reduce cost.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) on March 31 released its report calling for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to improve its oversight of the Centers of Excellence and Expertise (CEE).

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has produced a public video outlining the general FDA import process for FDA-regulated products. The agency said the video was developed to “fill a recognized gap between foreign suppliers and domestic importers/brokers on the details of the FDA admissibility process starting from declaration through the final admissibility decision.” Prior to this video, information about the FDA import process was only available through public websites or occasional webinars, industry trainings, and individual communications (email), FDA said. The video is available here.

Lynn Fritz, a longtime name associated with the U.S. customs broker industry, was inducted in The International Cargo Association (TIACA) Hall of Fame during the organization’s Executive Summit in San Francisco on March 22-25.

NCBFAA Regulatory Agencies Committee (RAC) Chair Mike Lahar on April 7 appeared before a House Natural Resources Subcommittee on the Russian seafood ban implementation and seafood traceability.

The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) added 120 Russian and Belarussian entities to the Entity List on April 1, effective immediately. These additions to the Entity List are part of the continued response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with the intention to hinder specific Russian and Belarusian sectors including defense, aerospace, and maritime.

Registrations to attend the NCBFAA’s 49th Annual Conference in Tucson, Arizona, have far exceeded our expectations and the projected attendance is anticipated to be back to pre-pandemic levels.

NCBFAA’s Transportation Committee, along with Transportation Counsel Ashley Craig of Venable and Legislative Counsel Nicole Bivens Collinson of Sandler, Travis & Rosenberg, are tracking the Ocean Shipping Reform Act of 2022 as it makes its way through the final stages of approval in Congress and eventually to the President’s desk for signature.

Politico on March 16 reported a “Canadian railway worker strike [was] set for Wednesday.” The strike is anticipated to “cut off a key trade corridor with the U.S.” and cause price spikes for oil, fertilizer, and food products. The strike stemmed from a labor dispute between the workers and the Canadian Pacific Railway company. As spring planting season approaches, the inaccessibility of fertilizer would be detrimental to US farmers, who have already struggled with increasing fertilizer prices.

The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have continued to postpone their “Container Dwell Fee,” and said they will reconsider its possible imposition on April 15.

The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) filed a final rule further expanding the Russian Sanctions. In response to Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, with Belarus’s support, the BIS final rule expands the license requirement for Russia and Belarus to all items on the Commerce Control List (CCL), effective April 8. This change adds products controlled in categories 0-2, in addition to the previous license requirement for all items in Categories 3-9, which now imposes a license requirement on all ECCNs for Russia or Belarus.