On October 31, 2024, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that effective November 1, 2024, four textile Chinese entities have been added to the UFLPA Entity List. These entities have been determined by DHS to be facilities and entities that source material from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region or from persons working with the government of Xinjiang or the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps for purposes of the ‘‘poverty alleviation’’ program or the ‘‘pairing-assistance’’ program or any other government labor scheme that uses forced labor. See DHS press release for more details on these companies.
As a result of their listing on the UFLPA Entity List, goods produced by these entities will be presumed to be made by forced labor and subject to detention under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. DHS Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas stated that “[o]ur Department will continue to aggressively enforce the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and, in doing so, we stand up for human rights, safeguard a free and fair marketplace, and hold perpetrators accountable.”
For general background information on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), see Thompson Hine’s International Trade Update of June 2022.