Some of the Federal Maritime Commission’s proposed changes to its rules for Carrier Automated Tariffs (see 2205090006) are unnecessary and could place too heavy a burden on industry, two trade groups and a logistics company said in comments this month. The commenters were especially critical of a proposed change that would add more requirements to container documentation, and said they wouldn't support a proposal that would allow a non-vessel operating common carrier (NVOCC) to cross-reference the terms in a vessel-operating common carrier’s (VOCC) tariffs.
Kenya recently issued more tariff exemptions for certain feed ingredient imports to address rising domestic costs of feed, the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service said in a July 1 report. The country will exempt “genetically engineered Bt. cottonseed cake, distillers’ dried grains with solubles, and rapeseed cake” from the import duties, the agency said. USDA said the moves aren't likely to reduce feed costs because Kenya restricts imports of “most” GE feed ingredients.
The Federal Maritime Commission’s spring 2022 regulatory agenda includes a new mention of a proposed rule that could revise and clarify certain Shipping Act requirements. The rule would specifically propose to “modernize outdated requirements” and clarify existing ones associated with the filing of ocean common carrier and marine terminal operator agreements. The FMC plans to publish a notice of proposed rulemaking in August with a comment period ending in September and a final rule in December.
Singapore State Courts fined Chin Yew Wen, a Singaporean national, $2.38 million (in Singapore dollars) for evading Goods and Services Tax, Singapore Customs announced July 5. Should the defendant not pay, he will spend 32 months in prison. The sole director of freight forwarding company GLS Shipping, Chin pleaded guilty to two charges of fraudulently evading GST, two similar charges and four other charges of falsification of documents after Singapore Customs found discrepancies between the importer's Cargo Clearance Permits and GLS's permits. Customs said Chin gave the agency fraudulent values of the goods when making declarations for the permits, reflecting lower values than the value of the goods and pocketing the difference in the GST paid. The evaded GST amounted to $433,484.49.
India's Directorate General of Foreign Trade issued a clarification July 5 on its import policy for 201 tariff lines from "Free" to "Free subject to registration under the Paper Import Monitoring System." The clarification followed an inquiry to DGFT on whether the PIMS registration was required at both the import point into Special Economic Zone (SEZ)/Free Trade and Warehousing Zones (FTWZ) and at the Customs Clearance from the SEZ to the Domestic Tariff Area (DTA) and whether the registration also is needed for Export Oriented Units at the time of import by an EOU.
The U.K. is keeping holdover safeguards on five categories of steel products despite the tariffs violating Britain's World Trade Organization commitments, U.K. International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan said in a June 29 speech to the House of Commons. When the U.K. left the EU, it kept its safeguards covering 19 categories of steel. Throughout 2021, the Trade Remedies Authority reviewed the measures, recommending the government remove safeguards on nine of those categories. In June 2021, the U.K. said it would extend the safeguards on 10 product categories for three years and remove them on four of the remaining nine, extending the safeguards for one year on the other five. The TRA then carried out additional analysis, leading to Trevelyan calling for the continuation of the tariffs on the five steel categories for another two years, until June 30, 2024.
Singapore Customs arrested four individuals -- two Chinese nationals and two Singaporean nationals -- and seized 1,100 cartons of cigarettes for which duties had not been paid, the customs agency announced June 30. During the operation, Singapore Customs saw brown boxes being moved between a van and a car parked next to it. Officers conducted checks on the suspicion that the boxes had duty-unpaid cigarettes, ultimately discovering the 1,100 cartons and arresting the four individuals. Singapore Customs said the total duty and Goods and Services tax evaded were $93,940 and $7,470 (in Singapore dollars), respectively. "Investigations are ongoing," it said.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said it's reasonable to shield the U.K. steel industry with tariffs that mirror those found in other European countries, Bloomberg reported. Responding to Sunday Telegraph reports that he is ready to skirt World Trade Organization rules to impose new tariffs, Johnson said June 26 at the Group of Seven summit that tariffs could help alleviate hard times for the steel industry due to high energy prices. “We need British steel to be provided with much cheaper energy and cheap electricity for its blast furnaces,” Johnson said. “But until we can fix that, I think it is reasonable for UK steel to have the same protections that other European, absolutely every other European steel economy does.”
Singapore imposed an $8 per liter duty on imports of samsu, Singapore Customs announced June 27. To comply with the April 2020 Declaration on Trade in Essential Goods for Combating the COVID-19 Pandemic, duties were discontinued on medicated and other varieties of samsu. Effective July 1, Singapore Customs is reinstating duties on medicated samsu of an alcoholic strength by volume not exceeding 40%, medicated samsu of an alcoholic strength by volume exceeding 40%, other samsu of an alcoholic strength by volume not exceeding 40%, and other samsu of an alcoholic strength by volume exceeding 40%.
The Commerce Department published its spring 2022 regulatory agenda for the Bureau of Industry and Security, including two new mentions of rules that could result in new emerging technology export controls.