Commerce TACs Want Trusted Exporter Program
Two technical committees that advise the Bureau of Industry and Security plan to work together on a proposal to create a "trusted exporter" program, similar to the trusted trader program for importers. Sensors and Instrumentation Technical Advisory Committee Co-Chair Jennifer O'Bryan said during a July 26 quarterly meeting of SINTAC that the Regulations and Procedures Technical Advisory Committee wants to work on such a proposal.
When others at the virtual meeting cheered the idea, O'Bryan cautioned: it would need to be evaluated through the interagency process, "let alone, BIS, before moving forward."
The proposal has not been written yet, but O'Bryan suggested that possible benefits for a company that qualified as a trusted exporter could be that foreign employees that might ordinarily trigger a "deemed exporter" process could get licenses, or that deemed exports wouldn't apply to the company at all.
SITAC has several proposals it's waiting to see if the government or Wassenar Committee accepts, including making A1 countries exempt from end use licenses, as well as changes to restricted product listings under semiconductor lasers for automotive lidar, tuned lasers, array and bar controls, individual semiconductor laser bars, semiconductor laser stacked arrays. In all cases, she said, these specific products can be removed from export controls because of foreign availability.
Attendees also heard about licensing statistics during the quarter, and how they compared to the same period the year before. In most categories, there were no denials, though a handful of applications were returned without action.
Some categories had fewer sales than the previous year, some 10% more sales, but the biggest change was in radar systems, where there was more than ten times the amount of licensed sales this year than in the previous period. All the sales were to Ukraine.
O'Bryan, who is director of government affairs for Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers, also reminded people that BIS is no longer trying to distinguish between emerging and foundational technologies as it works to identify new goods that should be subject to export controls, (see 2206270007).
She said they would discuss the new approach, of labeling both as Section 1758 tech, in the closed session. "Having to parse out what is emerging and what is foundational has led to some delays," she said.