The cybersecurity landscape for federal contractors shifted markedly after the issuance of Executive Order 13800 on May 11, 2018. Though the order itself was broad in its directiveâ€â€aiming to enhance the resilience of federal networks and critical infrastructureâ€â€it quickly became clear that its real teeth would be felt in the supply chains supporting those networks. […]
The International Trade Council is closely monitoring the impact of US-China trade tensions on global markets. As President Trump vows to double tariffs on $200bn of Chinese goods, stock markets worldwide have experienced significant losses. Japan’s Nikkei 225 index lost 1.5% on Wednesday, following a 1.8% drop in the Dow Jones. European markets also […]
When Bill C-208 received Royal Assent in June 2019, it marked a notable shift in Canada’s stance on tax avoidance and profit shifting, particularly where cross-border supply chains are concerned. The changes it introduced, especially to transfer pricing rules, were not revolutionary in isolation. But taken together, they represented a tightening of the netâ€â€an unmistakable […]
Small furniture exporters operating within or supplying to the European Union found themselves increasingly under scrutiny by mid-2019, as regulators stepped up enforcement of the EU Timber Regulation (EUTR). The regulation, originally adopted in 2013, has long aimed to prevent illegally harvested timber and timber products from entering the EU market. Yet for many smaller […]
The 2019 National Trade Estimate (NTE) Report, released by the Office of the United States Trade Representative in March, once again drew attention to a range of non-tariff barriers affecting American exporters, particularly in the electronics and automotive sectors. For seasoned trade analysts, much of the content felt familiarâ€â€concerns about divergent technical standards, opaque licensing […]
In January 2019, Natural Resources Canada released a discussion paper that, while perhaps under the radar for many outside policy circles, signaled a potentially significant shift in how large firmsâ€â€particularly those in energy-intensive sectorsâ€â€will be expected to account for supply-chain emissions. The paper focused on Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions, those indirect emissions that arise […]
The Social Value Act, first enacted in 2013, has long been praisedâ€â€and sometimes quietly criticizedâ€â€for its ambition to embed social benefit considerations into public procurement processes. For years, the legislation encouraged contracting authorities to look beyond price and technical merit, to consider how procurement decisions might contribute to broader community wellbeing. Yet, for all the […]
The European Union’s Medical Devices Regulation, published back in May 2017, introduced a host of transformative requirements aimed at reshaping medical device oversight, not least in the realm of supply chain traceability. The deadline for compliance may have felt distant at first. But by early 2019, manufacturers, suppliers, and regulators alike found themselves grappling with […]
When the 2018 U.S. Farm Bill was signed into law that December, it marked a turning point for hemp cultivation and its downstream industries, particularly for the burgeoning CBD sector. The removal of hemp from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act created both opportunity and uncertainty, especially as stakeholders sought clarity on supply chain […]
The passage of Canada’s Bill C-69 in June 2019 marked a profound change in how resource projects, notably pipelines and mines, would be evaluated and monitored from both environmental and social perspectives. The introduction of the Impact Assessment Act under this bill signaled a shiftâ€â€not merely in procedural requirements, but in the expectations placed on […]
In the wake of the U.S. Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of December 2017, supply chains tied to American operations began to undergo, often in subtle and sometimes in abrupt ways, restructuring that few could have fully predicted at the time of the law’s passage. The most visible driver, of course, was the reduction […]
The 2018 revisions to the European Union’s Waste Framework Directive marked a notable evolution in how policymakers sought to embed circular economy principles into industrial practice. While the Directive had long been a cornerstone of European environmental regulation, the updated text sharpened the focus on product designâ€â€particularly the expectation that manufacturers, especially in electronics, would […]
As discussions around digital equity grew louder in the United States toward the end of 2018, anticipation mounted regarding the forthcoming Broadband Deployment Accuracy and Technological Availability Act, or DATA Act. By March 2019, the legislation had formally entered into force, signaling a significant shift in how broadband coverage was to be reported and, just […]
When Canada’s draft Impact Assessment Act under Bill C-69 was released in June 2018, it marked, perhaps more than policymakers at first admitted, a shift in how offshore petroleum production and export projects would be expected to manageâ€â€and discloseâ€â€their supply chains. While most commentary at the time focused on the broader environmental review provisions, those […]
The International Trade Council commends the continuous progress made by member countries of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Vietnam, in spite of the absence of the United States following President Trump’s decision to withdraw. During the APEC summit, President Trump reiterated his ‘America First’ stance, […]
The launch of the U.K. Plastics Pact in April 2018 marked a significant, though arguably long overdue, shift in how packaging supply chains were expected to engage with circular economy goals. By November that year, the initial excitement surrounding the initiative had given way to the complex, often messy, work of translating its principles into […]