A Good Opportunity, and An Invitation
CBP is welcoming you to Washington. Come say hello!
CBP formally announced this week that it is convening a “Forced Labor Technical Expo” in Washington, DC on Tuesday, March 14 and Wednesday, March 15, 2023. Here is the Federal Register Notice containing the official announcement, and a link to the CBP event website. Registration is free, but must be completed by March 1. Here is the Expo registration link.
While the full event schedule hasn’t been posted yet, the purpose of the Expo is to create an opportunity for companies to showcase “solutions that identify goods produced using forced labor practices.” This would include companies selling services that help map supply chains, assess supply chain risks, or generally promote supply chain transparency. The event will unfold with two full days of programming. Day 1 will include a DHS-led (FLETF?) panel discussion, and Day 2 will include a CBP-led panel discussion, with a couple dozen service provider presentations scattered across both days.
This isn’t the first time CBP has convened this type of event, but it is the first time that they’re letting us in on it! A couple years ago, CBP solicited proposals from service providers in the supply chain mapping, traceability and due diligence spaces, and, as I later learned, proceeded to purchase for itself access to various services which it now uses to inform the enforcement process.
But the agency refused to tell anyone who had attended, let alone which services it deemed worth purchasing. I know they refused, because I submitted a FOIA request to find out, and this was the official reply:
Live and learn!
I like to tease CBP about the “guns and badges” mindset in a commercial trade enforcement context, but I’m glad to see that the “cloak and dagger” mindset—which characterized forced labor trade enforcement for many years—is giving way to norms of reasonable transparency. They’re holding the Expo again, have turned it into a two-day event, and this time you’re invited.
It can be hard to judge the merit of events like this in advance, but let me try and explain the value I see in attending. If you are with a company that reasonably expects it may have to navigate forced labor trade enforcement in the coming years, the investments you make today in one service provider or another can make all the difference down the road.
Today, we’re talking about forced labor trade enforcement at the pace of $2 to $3 billion per year. For the UFLPA, we’re focused on official “high priority sectors” of cotton, tomatoes and polysilicon, and CBP is shadow enforcing against aluminum and PVC. But what will the scale and focus of enforcement be in another 3 years?
I was in a meeting with a CBP auditor recently on a “forced labor” audit, and was told that CBP thinks the true aggregate import value of merchandise tainted with forced labor is north of $140 billion per year. He followed that with another eyebrow raiser—the number one impacted product is consumer electronics, a product category that has experienced no extensive enforcement that I’m aware of to date.
The point is, we can speculate all we like, but won’t know where enforcement is going until we get there. And yet, wherever we end up, the tools you have invested in and the advisors you have come to trust will be the best determinants of your outcomes. These are not trivial investments, and all that glitters is not gold. If you want to buy due diligence for your supply chain, it will pay to have conducted your own due diligence first.
While there is a livestream option for the Expo, at least half the value will be the opportunity to have conversations on the sidelines—to ask follow-up questions of presenting service providers and government reps in attendance. I’ll be there, with a Kelley Drye lapel pin, so please track me down and say hello!
Additionally, if you’re with a company and you decide to join the Expo in person, we’d like to extend you an invitation to join Kelley Drye’s Forced Labor Trade Enforcement Practice for a happy hour from 5:00 to 7:30 pm following the first day of the event.
This event is exclusively for members of the private sector (importing companies, trade associations and supply chain traceability & due diligence service providers). I will be joined by several of my colleagues, including fellow anchors of Kelley Drye’s Forced Labor Trade Enforcement Practice, my partner Paul Rosenthal and special counsel Jennifer McCadney. Paul is a lion of the trade bar, and has been advising companies on the eradication of forced and child labor from supply chains for 30 years. He is also currently Chairman of Kelley Drye & Warren. Jennifer is a brilliant colleague, former trade counsel on House Ways & Means, and longtime Section 307 guru who anchors all of our forced labor government relations work. When I have questions about forced labor trade enforcement, Jennifer is who I call.
We’ll convene at a venue just a short 5-minute walk from the Expo, and will be glad to offer you drinks and passed hors d’oeuvres, followed by an AMA-style (“ask me anything”) Q&A session. It will be a safe space to ask questions without attribution (no press, no activists, no government reps), and we’ll tell you what we really think. I expect that many of our friends and trusted partners in the supply chain mapping, traceability and due diligence space will join us as well.
Please register here so we can know to expect you!
Last, a substantive nugget for the road.
Yesterday, the Senate Finance Committee convened a hearing on “Ending Trade that Cheats American Workers By Modernizing Trade Laws and Enforcement, Fighting Forced Labor, Eliminating Counterfeits, and Leveling the Playing Field.” This hearing is a precursor to legislative work that will likely result in multi-disciplinary trade legislation during the current Congress.
It was a super informative discussion. You can watch the full 2-hour hearing at the link above. Or, our government relations team pulled together a 5,300 word synoptic transcript (same day!), with all comments and exchanges attributed to the speakers. That write up is available at no charge for Kelley Drye clients - just let me know.
The hearing contained lot of interesting discussion about “customs modernization”, and plenty of commentary about “forced labor trade enforcement”, virtually all of which I agree with. But oddly (in my view) the entire colloquy elided the most obvious synthesis of all: that the U.S. forced labor import ban needs to be modernized.
This is a law that was written the same year that Laurel and Hardy released their first speaking film, Salvador Dali had his first public exhibition, and Grace Kelly was born. And it’s never evolved. Is there is any law in the “Title 19” pantheon (that is, the U.S. customs laws) more worthy of modernization?
In this arena, it’s the most important question we can ask.