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- Title
E-Commerce Transactions and Country of Origin Marking for Imported Products: A Gap Between Statutory Purpose and Legal Requirements.
- Authors
ABELY, CHRISTINE
- Abstract
With some exceptions, items imported into the United States from abroad have been required to bear a marking indicating their country of origin since the passage of the Tariff Act of 1890. Identification of a product's country of origin serves several purposes, including identifying the duty rate and applicability of certain tariffs. Most importantly for the purposes of this Article, a country of origin marking provides information to a consumer about an item's geographic origin at the time of sale so that a consumer can choose to base a purchasing decision on that information. The rise in the volume of e-commerce transactions within the United States, however, has created a gap between this intended purpose and the relevant statute and associated regulations. While the statute and regulations require only that a physical item be marked with its country of origin, the physical item in an e-commerce transaction is not available to the consumer until after the sale has been completed. Therefore, a consumer who cannot physically inspect an item at the point of sale cannot incorporate a product's country of origin into his or her purchasing decision. This Article examines whether the country of origin marking regulations administered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection should be amended to include a new requirement that a product's country of origin be disclosed at the online point of sale. This Article also identifies further areas of research that could be explored, including those which may be useful in determining the potential effectiveness of country of origin disclosures made at online points of sale, and considers available alternatives to the implementation of additional country of origin marking rules in the context of remote sales.
- Subjects
ELECTRONIC commerce; ELECTRONIC funds transfers; COUNTRY of origin (Commerce); EXPORT &; import trade of commercial products; TARIFF
- Publication
Virginia Journal of International Law, 2020, Vol 60, Issue 1, p1
- ISSN
0042-6571
- Publication type
Article