The Committee for the Implementation of Textile Agreements (CITA) has updated its preliminary textile and apparel import data by adding monthly April 2005 data.
The Committee for the Implementation of Textile Agreements (CITA) has issued a notice announcing that it has resumed its consideration of whether to implement safeguard quotas based on "threat of" market disruption for China-origin textiles and apparel in the following individual or merged categories:
On April 29, 2005, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) announced the results of its 2005 "Special 301" annual report on intellectual property rights (IPR) protection.
The Committee for the Implementation of Textile Agreements (CITA) has posted to its web site updated preliminary textile and apparel import data for 2005, which now covers the 2005 period from January to April 23rd.
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The Entertainment Software Assn. (ESA) called on the Malaysian govt. to increase its level of intellectual property protection after the country was included in a “Watch List” of countries announced Fri. by Peter Allgeier, the Acting U.S. Trade Rep. (USTR). ESA applauded the USTR’s action in placing Malaysia and other countries involved in widespread game piracy on the list. ESA Pres. Douglas Lowenstein called Malaysia “the primary source of pirated optical disc entertainment software in the world.” He said “the prevalence of pirated products and their export from the country hinders the development of legitimate entertainment software markets in target export countries, and makes it extremely difficult for game publishers to establish legitimate markets in those areas.” Exports of pirated entertainment software produced in Malaysia had been seized in more than 20 countries on 5 continents, he said, adding that the “problem of production and export by optical disc factories in Malaysia must be immediately addressed.” Although Malaysia remains the primary country of concern for the video and computer game industry, large-scale production of pirated entertainment software products also occurs in China, Russia, Thailand and Ukraine, ESA said. It said Russia remains on the Priority Watch List (PWL) but USTR also announced an out-of-cycle review will be conducted later this year. The ESA said it “urges USTR to continue close monitoring of Russia’s efforts in addressing the country’s severe piracy problems, to ensure that the country’s weak IPR enforcement regime is satisfactorily resolved before finalizing Russia’s WTO accession process.” China, meanwhile, was added to the PWL, “signaling USTR’s heightened concern over unabated piracy in the country and the lack of enforcement,” ESA said. The USTR’s Special 301 Report continued to list Ukraine as a Priority Foreign Country and named 14 countries to the PWL and 36 to the Watch List, with Paraguay remaining under Section 306 monitoring. Other countries of particular concern to the entertainment software industry identified in the report included Brazil, Canada and Mexico.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has issued a notice announcing its fiscal year (FY) 2005 systematic review of its current substantive regulations to ensure, to the maximum practical extent, consistency among them and with respect to accomplishing program goals.
To spotlight neglect of intellectual property (IP) protection rights, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chmn. Lugar (R-Ind.) and Finance Committee Ranking Democrat Baucus (Mont.) introduced a resolution Tues. to highlight the damage done by China and Russia. Tallying over $4 billion in losses to U.S. creators of copyright products alone, the resolution cited those nations’ failure to live by international standards of protection and enforcement. The resolution, timed to coincide with World Intellectual Property Day, describes piracy in China and Russia as “open, notorious and permitted to operate without meaningful hindrance from the governments of those countries.”
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued a guidance document, entitled Entry Types and Entry Identifiers, for submitting prior notice (PN) of imported food in the Automated Commercial System/Automated Broker Interface (ACS/ABI), mini-ABI (WP), or Prior Notice System Interface (PNSI).
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has issued an advance notice of proposed rulemaking (ANPR) to initiate a rulemaking proceeding to determine the risks of injury associated with the mechanical malfunction of cigarette lighters. The CPSC is soliciting comments on certain regulatory alternatives and other possible ways to address these risks and the economic impacts of such alternatives.