Background

U.S. Customs and Border Protection saw increases in some measures of its efforts to enforce trade laws and regulations governing textiles in the first quarter of 2021 but decreases in others, according to recently-released statistics.

For more information on trade-related issues affecting textiles and apparel, please contact attorney Elise Shibles at (415) 490-1403 or via email.

Textile and apparel goods have some of the highest import duty rates in the U.S. and may also be subject to Section 301 additional tariffs if imported from China. Schemes designed to circumvent these tariffs include false invoicing, false marking and labeling, false claims of origin, illegal transshipment, misdescription, undervaluation, false declarations of the right to make entry, false trade preference claims, and smuggling.

Textile and apparel goods are thus a top priority for CBP enforcement efforts. The chart below highlights trends in these efforts over the past year.

 

1Q 2021

4Q 2020

1Q 2020

Section 301 duties collected

$759 million

$851 million

$1.25 billion

Factory visits

0

0

16

% factories discrepant

n/a

n/a

50

Non-IPR seizure number

131

120

185

Non-IPR seizure value

$1.1 million

$490,000

$2 million

IPR seizure number

1,195

1,231

1,442

IPR seizure value

$8.9 million

$12.2 million

$5.6 million

Commercial fraud penalties

2

0

0

Commercial fraud penalty value

$189,000

0

0

Liquidated damages claims

102

104

41

Cargo examinations

2,857

2,672

3,570

% cargo shipments discrepant

5.85

5.13

7.28

Audits completed

7

10

10

Recommended/accepted audit recoveries

0

$4.2 million

$15.0 million

Lab samples tested

188

109

184

% samples discrepant

39.0

45.0

48.9

Special enforcement operations initiated

5

2

2

Special enforcement operations completed

6

4

2

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