U.S. Government Delays New Importer Rules For Russian Metals

As Connecting the Dots reported at the time, in February the Biden administration announced it would raise tariffs on more than 100 Russian chemical products, minerals, and metals, including aluminum, that together are worth $2.8 billion. That proclamation also required importers provide the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) with information to identify the countries where the primary aluminum used in the manufacture of aluminum and derivative articles imports are smelted and cast.

The administration has now delayed that portion of that order.

Specifically, on March 30, CBP announced it will delay implementation of new requirements for reporting the countries of smelt and cast for imports of aluminum and aluminum derivative products to allow additional time to update their software programming and systems to comply with the new reporting requirements.

The requirements had been set to take effect on April 10, 2023. They will now be implemented a month later, on May 10, 2023.

The CBP said there is no change to the April 10, 2023 effective date of the 200 percent duties on imports of aluminum and derivative aluminum articles that are products of Russia or products “where any amount of primary aluminum used in the manufacture of such aluminum articles is smelted in Russia, or where such aluminum articles are cast in Russia.”