20 February 2008

COAC member opposes panel on security filing rule

This article is excerpted from the 20 February 2008 edition of “The Journal of Commerce”.

A member of the Customs trade advisory committee has submitted public comments that differ with the position the committee took on the proposed importer security filing, or 10+2, rule.

In a letter filed Feb. 11, Anthony Barone, a member of the Departmental Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of Customs and Border Protection and Related Agencies, questions if the collection of 12 additional data elements from importers and carriers will materially improve security in the United States.

“The case that advanced data…will actually be preventative has not been made by experimentation, testing, statistical extrapolation or any other means,” wrote Barone, director of global logistics policy for Pfizer. But he said his letter reflected his own views as a member of COAC, and not those of the pharmaceutical maker.

In the letter Barone asks if security benefits from the rule outweigh the cost of compliance, particularly for more than 800,000 small importers or companies that infrequently import goods. Customs estimated the overall cost of compliance to the industry would be $650 million, based on research by an outside firm. Barone said that $5 billion could be a more accurate estimate.

Barone says that Customs plans to go ahead with integrating the additional security data without independent analysis of the Automated Targeting System that Congress called for in the SAFE Port Act of 2006….

At its quarterly meeting last week in Tucson, COAC endorsed a comment letter that supported the principle that the government needed additional data for identifying high-risk cargo, but made suggestions for modifying the proposed rule. The comment period for the proposed rule ends March 13….