President Obama has issued a Proclamation affecting trade.
- Select countries have undergone a status change on whether they will be considered designated countries eligible under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) for 2015.
Under AGOA the following changes were made:
– The Republic of Guinea-Bissau (Guinea-Bissau) was restored as a beneficiary sub-Saharan African country.
– The South Sudan and The Gambia were terminated as beneficiary sub-Saharan African countries, effective on January 1, 2015, as they are not making continual progress in meeting the requirements.
- Duty-free access was granted to specified quantities of certain agricultural products from Israel under the United States-Israel Free Trade Area Implementation Act of 1985 (ILFTA) through the close of December 31, 2015. This was done to maintain the general level of reciprocal and mutually advantageous concessions with respect to Israel provided for by the USIFTA.
- Also approved were certain modifications to the HTS which had been recommended by the US International Trade Commission (ITC) in Publication 4392 (making certain technical corrections to keep the HTS in conformity with international standards and to make certain reclassifications of chemical products that would alleviate unnecessary administrative burdens). These recommended modifications were found to have little or no economic effect on any industry in the United States.
- Technical corrections were made correcting an error that affected the tariff treatment of goods under HTS heading 9914.99.20 after December 31, 2015, under Implement the United States-Bahrain Free Trade Agreement (BHFTA).
Questions about this regulatory update may be directed to Livingston’s U.S. Regulatory Affairs group .