General

According to Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation, the COVID-19 epidemic is still raging in the United States. Recently, various respiratory viruses are rampant throughout the United States, leading to a crisis in the United States medical system. On this occasion, the US government decided to continue to extend the 301 tariff amnesty for Chinese anti epidemic medical supplies.

Recently, the Office of the United States Trade Representative announced that, in response to the COVID-19, it had decided to extend the validity period of exemption from additional tariffs on 81 medical protection products imported from China to the United States for another three months, until February 28, 2023. It was originally scheduled to expire on November 30, 2022.

According to the import and export data observation report of Huacheng, exempted products include sterilized hand sanitizer pump bottles, plastic containers for sterilized wipes, sphygmomanometers, fingertip pulse oximeters, nuclear magnetic resonance imaging machines, etc.

The Office of the United States Trade Representative said that it may continue to consider further extension or modification of the tariff amnesty to China "as appropriate".

It is worth mentioning that the relevant exemptions have been extended several times before.

According to Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation, the US Trade Representative Office announced for the first time in December 2020 that it would exempt 80 kinds of medical products imported from China related to the COVID-19 from additional tariffs, and then add 19 kinds of products.

The period of exemption from additional duties on these 99 products was later extended to September 30 of last year and then to November 30 of the same year. The exemption period for 81 kinds of products was extended to May 31 this year and then to November 30.

Previously, former President Trump of the United States imposed tariffs on Chinese goods worth hundreds of billions of dollars to the United States on the grounds of his so-called unfair trade practices and theft of American intellectual property rights.

In 2019, the Trump government announced that it would impose 15% tariffs on Chinese goods worth about 125 billion dollars. Later, in the first phase of the trade agreement signed between China and the United States last January, the tariff rate was reduced from 15% to 7.5%. Some of these commodities have been temporarily exempted from customs duties, Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation reported.

Until last March, when the epidemic accelerated its spread in the United States, the United States government began to exempt tariffs on Chinese medical materials.

In this regard, the Ministry of Commerce of China has repeatedly stated that China always believes that the US 301 tariff measures against China are not conducive to both China and the United States and the world as a whole. Our spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce, Shu Jueting, once said that he hoped that the US side, proceeding from the fundamental interests of consumers and producers in China and the United States, would eliminate all tariffs imposed on China as soon as possible, so as to push bilateral economic and trade relations back to normal at an early date.

The 81 medical protection products include:

Disposable plastic filter, disposable electrocardiogram (ECG) electrode, fingertip pulse oximeter, sphygmomanometer, nuclear magnetic resonance imager, spare parts of carbon dioxide detector, otoscope, anesthesia mask, X-ray examination table, X-ray tube shell and its components, polyethylene film, gold sodium, powdered silicon monoxide, disposable gloves, artificial fiber non-woven cloth, hand sanitizer pump bottle, plastic container for disinfection wipes Retest binocular optical microscope, compound optical microscope, transparent plastic mask, disposable plastic sterile curtain and cover, disposable shoe cover and boot cover, cotton abdominal cavity surgical sponge, disposable medical mask, protective articles, etc., Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation Report.