CBP posted a new fact sheet about the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and how the law will affect importers when it is implemented on June 21.
The 11 withhold release orders currently in place that involve companies or products from the Xinjiang region in China will become subject to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act as of June 21, said Elva Muneton, CBP acting executive director for the UFLPA Implementation Task Force, while speaking to a Los Angeles Customs Brokers and Freight Forwarders Association webinar June 2. That means goods subject to those WROs that are detained by CBP as of June 21 will require clear and convincing evidence that forced labor wasn't involved to be allowed to enter the U.S, she said. Before June 21, those detained goods would continue through the WRO process, Muneton said.
Despite industry requests for delayed enforcement of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act to allow for a review of CBP's coming guidance around the new law (see 2203110059), the agency seems set for full implementation starting June 21, said Elva Muneton, CBP acting executive director for the UFLPA Implementation Task Force. "The expectation is that we will be ready to implement the Uyghur Act on June 21 and that we have the resources and that we're going to take the approach of addressing any shipments coming from that region," she said. "So the question is, are we ready to implement? Yes, we are. June 21." Muneton and others spoke June 1 during the first of three CBP webinars about the UFLPA (see 2205250021).
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Just three weeks before the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act will go into effect, many important questions remain unanswered, said Richard Mojica, a former CBP headquarters attorney now with Miller & Chevalier.
The CBP Office of Trade Relations plans to host webinars on three dates in June to give an overview of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, the agency said on its UFLPA site. The webinars are scheduled for June 1, 10-11 a.m. EDT; June 7, 1-2 p.m. EDT; and June 16, 2-3 p.m. EDT.
The four leaders of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, a Democrat and a Republican from each chamber, are asking appropriators to fully fund the CBP request of $70.3 million to implement the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, for more employees, technology and training.
CBP recently posted an overview of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and forced labor withhold release order enforcement mechanisms. The table provides citations of the legal basis behind detention, appeal, evidentiary level and authorization under the UFLPA and WRO processes.
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Applied DNA Sciences recently received a first request for traceable tagged cotton "that is directly attributable to the recent passage of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act," the company said in an earnings news release. The company's CertainT platform is described as allowing for raw materials and products to be traced through unique molecular identifiers. "Our team has presented to many members of Congress, Federal agencies, and Committees regarding the utility of our platform in enforcing the Act," the company said. "Though not expected to be material to revenue in the current fiscal year, the shipment anticipates a global brand’s multi-year commitment to our CertainT platform through a scaled deployment across its many supply chains. We believe that the passage of the Act is a trigger point for the wider adoption of our CertainT platform that holds the potential for molecular taggant sales for textile fiber applications to become a second material revenue stream," it said. "With less than 45 days before the Act goes into force, we believe interest in CertainT by brands and their supply chains has never been higher.”