Earlier this evening, the United States Trade Representative (“USTR”) announced that it will extend certain relief on China tariffs for PPE and medical care products. The relief comes as certain product exclusions were set to expire at the end of the year. The USTR has announced that these extended product exclusions will apply as of January 1, 2021 through March 31, 2021.
The USTR claimed that it has assessed medical necessity throughout the Section 301 product exclusion process, and it prioritized the review of requests addressing medical-care products related to the U.S. response to COVID-19.
In March 2020, the USTR also requested public comments and applications for further modifications to remove Section 301 duties from additional medical-care products to address the COVID-19 outbreak. Many of those applications had remained open and un-addressed until today.
As a result, the USTR has also published new product exclusions for other items deemed related to the fight against COVID-19 based on applications received under the agency’s request for comments on such items in March 2020. The new exemptions will also become effective as of January 1, 2021 and last through March 31, 2021.
The full USTR notice along with the list of products subject to relief can be found here.
We recommend that importers take care to ensure their customs brokers use Immediate Delivery ID procedures to take advantage of 2021 tariff duty rates in 2020 where possible in light of these exclusions. For more information, consult CBP guidance here.
Should you have any questions concerning the new and extended relief, please contact one of the trade professionals here.
USTR Provides Section 301 Relief on Products Used in the Fight Against COVID-19