By George W. Thompson
It’s the annual event we’ve all been waiting for! The Office of the United States Trade Representative has announced its 2016/2017 review of the Generalized System of Preferences. This provides an opportunity for domestic and importing interests to seek changes to GSP coverage. There’s a tight schedule, however, with requests due by October 4.
GSP is a trade preference program through which the United States provides duty-free entry to eligible products manufactured in and imported from qualifying developing countries (called “beneficiary developing countries”). USTR conducts its Annual Review to determine whether specific products should be added to or deleted from the list of GSP eligible items, and whether certain beneficiary countries should have their GSP eligible status modified.
This year’s review follows the same process. “Interested parties” may petition USTR to designate additional articles for GSP eligibility, remove or otherwise limit eligibility for currently-designated items, or make other types of changes for specific products.
Petitions to waive the “competitive need limitation” also are solicited. While GSP is intended to provide a tariff advantage to developing countries, it provides for automatic removal of specific items from specific countries that exceed one of two benchmarks: imports of the item from a single country exceed 50 percent or more of all imports (measured by value), or exceed a designated dollar limit ($170,000,000 for 2015). The removal requirement may be waived at the President’s discretion.
Per usual, USTR also will evaluate whether specific countries’ practices regarding intellectual property protection and worker rights warrant losing GSP eligibility. Finally, the extension of GSP benefits to certain travel and luggage goods from more highly developed beneficiary countries is also on the table this year.
Petitions to modify the list of articles eligible for duty-free treatment or the GSP status of a beneficiary developing country are due for submission by October 4, 2016, while competitive need waiver petitions must be filed by December 2, 2016. USTR’s review announcement is published here.
