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Trade and Industry Department The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region
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Commercial Information Circulars

24-hour hotline : 23 922 922

e-mail address : enquiry@tid.gov.hk

Ref. : EIC 111/2/18
EIC 111/3
EIC 111/3/13

14 December 2021

Dear Sirs,

Commercial Information Circular No. 873/2021

US : Section 232 Tariffs on Imported Steel and Aluminium - Removal of Certain General Approved Exclusions (GAEs)

Further to Commercial Information Circular (CIC) No. 891/2020 of 14 December 2020, the US Department of Commerce (DoC) announced on 9 December 2021 an interim final rule to remove certain General Approved Exclusions (GAEs), specifically 26 GAEs for steel and 4 GAEs for aluminium from the previous GAEs. The removal of the 30 GAEs will take effect on 27 December 2021.

DETAILS

2.The US imposed additional tariffs of 25% and 10% on steel and aluminium products respectively imported from all countries/economies (except certain economies which are fully exempted or subject to quotas) on 23 March 2018 under the Section 232 investigation. The US further included certain derivatives of steel and aluminium products for the additional tariffs on 8 February 2020. The US DoC has also developed an exclusion process for manufacturers to submit requests for the exclusion of specific products from the additional tariffs. For details, please refer to CIC Nos. 264/2018, 283/2018 and 90/2020 dated 16 March 2018, 20 March 2018 and 6 February 2020 respectively.

3.On 14 December 2020, the US DoC published an interim final rule (the "14 December rule") to make additional revisions to the Section 232 exclusion process and adopted GAEs to improve efficiency for approving certain exclusions for use by all importers and did not include quantity limits. The first approved tranche of GAEs included 108 GAEs for steel and 15 GAEs for aluminium. For details, please refer to CIC No. 891/2020 dated 14 December 2020.

4.On 9 December 2021, the US DoC announced to remove 26 GAEs for steel and 4 GAEs for aluminium from the first tranche of GAEs (i.e. 108 GAEs for steel and 15 GAEs for aluminium) as announced on 14 December 2020. The removal, which will take effect on 27 December 2021, is based on reviewing public comments and the US DoC's additional analysis.

5.For details, please refer to the relevant Federal Register (FR) notices:

  • FR notice on removal of the 30 GAEs under Section 232 Tariff Exclusions (9 December 2021):
    https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2021-12-09/pdf/2021-26634.pdf
  • FR notice on the 14 December rule (14 December 2020):
    https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2020-12-14/pdf/2020-27110.pdf

ENQUIRIES

6.For enquiries concerning the content of this circular, please contact Miss K Y HO at telephone number 2398 5405.

Yours faithfully,

(Miss Ivy TAM)
for Director-General of Trade and Industry

Note: While every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of the above information, the Department cannot guarantee this to be so and will not be held liable for any reliance placed on the same.