On July 10, 2020, the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) will publish in the Federal Register a notice of product exclusions from the action involving imposition of 15% additional duties (lowered to 7.5% on January 22, 2020) on approximately $300Bn in Chinese products. The USTR initiated a product exclusion process in October 2019, and interested persons have submitted requests for the exclusion of specific products. This notice announces USTR’s determination to grant certain exclusion requests, as specified in the Annex to the notice, and make certain amendments to previously announced exclusions. The USTR will continue to issue decisions on pending requests on a periodic basis. The product exclusions in the notice apply as of September 1, 2019, the effective date of Annex A to List 1 of the $300 billion action (generally referred to as List or Tranche 4A), and will extend to September 1, 2020.
Based on the evaluation of factors set forth in an October 24, 2019 notice (84 FR 57144), USTR has determined to grant 61 specially prepared product descriptions, which together respond to 86 separate exclusion requests. In accordance with the October 24 notice, the exclusions are available for any product that meets the description in the Annex, regardless of whether the importer filed an exclusion request. Further, the scope of each exclusion is governed by the scope of the ten-digit HTSUS subheading as described in the Annex, and not by the product descriptions set out in any particular request for exclusion.
- Annex Paragraph A, subparagraphs (1)-(2) create a new HTS 9903.88.51 and insert a new US note 20 (ddd) to subchapter III of chapter 99, HTS.
- Annex Paragraph A, subparagraphs (3)-(4) of the Annex contain conforming amendments to the HTSUS reflecting the modifications made by the Annex.
- Annex Paragraph B, subparagraphs (1)-(27) of the Annex contain technical corrections to address periodic revisions to the HTSUS subheadings in previously published exclusions.
