Proclamation 5911 -- To Implement Changes to the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States

November 19, 1988

By the President of the United States

of America

A Proclamation

1. Section 1204(a) of the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 (the Act) (P.L. 100 - 418; 19 U.S.C. 3004(a)) enacts the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States (the HTS). Section 1204(b) (19 U.S.C. 3004(b)) confers authority upon the President to proclaim such modifications to the HTS as are consistent with the standards applied in converting the Tariff Schedules of the United States (TSUS) (19 U.S.C. 1202) into the format of the International Convention on the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (Harmonized System) and are necessary or appropriate to implement: (1) future outstanding staged rate reductions; (2) the applicable provisions of statutes enacted, Executive actions taken, and final judicial decisions rendered, after January 1, 1988, and before January 1, 1989; and (3) such technical rectifications as the President considers necessary.

2. Pursuant to the terms of Section 1204(b)(1) of the Act, I have determined that certain modifications to the HTS are necessary or appropriate in order to implement the future outstanding staged rate reductions for products of countries entitled to most-favored-nation treatment, as set forth in Annex I to this Proclamation; the future outstanding staged rate reductions for products of Israel, as set forth in Annex II to this Proclamation; and the applicable provisions of statutes enacted and Executive actions taken after January 1, 1988, and before January 1, 1989, along with certain necessary technical rectifications, all of which are set forth in Annex IV to this Proclamation.

3. In Proclamations 5779 of March 23, 1988 (53 FR 9850), and 5805 of April 29, 1988 (53 FR 15785), I terminated preferential tariff treatment under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) (19 U.S.C. 2461 et seq.) for articles that are eligible for such treatment and that are imported from Bahrain, Bermuda, Brunei Darussalam, Nauru, Hong Kong, the Republic of Korea, Panama, Singapore, or Taiwan, and I modified the general headnotes and other provisions of the TSUS to reflect such terminations. In Proclamation 5787 of March 31, 1988 (53 FR 11031), I also modified the TSUS to reflect the decisions made in the 1987 annual review of the GSP. Further, to carry forward these decisions into the nomenclature of the HTS, pursuant to Sections 1204(b)(1) and 1211(b) of the Act, and consistent with the standards to be applied in converting the TSUS into the format of the Harmonized System, I have determined, pursuant to Title V of the Trade Act of 1974 (the Trade Act), as amended, that certain countries should be redesignated as beneficiary developing countries with respect to certain eligible articles and that certain beneficiary developing countries should no longer receive preferential tariff treatment under the GSP with respect to certain eligible articles. I have determined that the modifications for purposes of the GSP set forth in Annex III are necessary or appropriate to implement in the HTS the applicable provisions of Proclamations 5779, 5787, and 5805, and the additional actions associated with implementing these decisions under the HTS nomenclature.

4. Section 604 of the Trade Act, as amended by Section 1214(j)(4) of the Act (19 U.S.C. 2483, as amended), confers authority upon the President to embody in the HTS the substance of the relevant provisions of that Act, of other acts affecting import treatment, and of actions taken thereunder.

Now, Therefore, I, Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America, acting under the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the statutes of the United States, including but not limited to Sections 1204, 1211, and 1214 of the Act and Title V and Section 604 of the Trade Act, do proclaim that:

(1) For each of the HTS subheadings enumerated in Annex I, the ``General'' subcolumn of rate of duty column 1 shall be modified as provided in such Annex on the dates specified therein.

(2) For each of the HTS headings/subheadings enumerated in Annex II, the ``Special'' subcolumn of rate of duty column 1 shall be modified as provided in such Annex on the dates specified therein.

(3) Each occurrence of the symbol corresponding to the United States-Israel Free Trade Area program in the HTS is modified by striking out ``I'' and inserting ``IL'' in lieu thereof.

(4) The HTS is further modified as set forth in Annexes III and IV to this Proclamation.

(5) Any provisions of previous proclamations and Executive orders inconsistent with the provisions of this Proclamation are hereby superseded to the extent of such inconsistency.

(6) The provisions of this Proclamation shall be effective with respect to goods entered, or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, on and after January 1, 1989.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this 19th day of November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-eight, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirteenth.

Ronald Reagan

[Filed with the Office of the Federal Register, 11:23 a.m., November 21, 1988]

Note: The annexes were printed in the ``Federal Register'' of November 22.