News
The Foreign-Trade Zones Board has completed its first regulatory overhaul of the FTZ program in 20 years and will soon publish new rules in the Federal Register. The revised regulations are designed to improve the FTZ program’s flexibility and responsiveness, enhance ease of use for applicants and promote greater transparency for stakeholders and the public. FTZs may be used to warehouse imported and domestic products, and with specific authority from the FTZ Board companies may use zones for manufacturing (incorporating components into different, finished products). Products warehoused or manufactured in FTZs may ultimately be exported or shipped to the U.S. market. There are currently more than 500 FTZs and subzones nationwide, and companies in FTZs employ nearly 330,000 U.S. workers and export about $30 billion a year in merchandise. According to information from the Department of Commerce, the new regulations include the following provisions. - replace the prior manufacturing approval procedures, which required a complex application that took up to 12 months to process, with a simpler standard notification process that will reduce the ordinary processing time to 120 days - provide a public comment period for all proposed manufacturing activity and allow the FTZ Board to conduct a more extensive application process if issues arise - streamline and expedite the procedures for designating locations as subzones for individual companies’ use by simplifying the information required in subzone applications, cutting by 50% the time ordinarily required to process applications and drawing a clear distinction between a new subzone designation for a company and the separate process for the FTZ Board to consider potential manufacturing activity for the company
