New Legislation Proposed to Prevent Future Port Strikes
Following three days of a labor strike, dockworkers at ports along the US East and Gulf coasts will resume work this morning to move cargo, after the International Longshoremen’s Association yesterday agreed to extend their labor contract with the U.S. Maritime Alliance until Jan. 15. The strike was already causing major problems for the supply chain and would have wreaked havoc on the economy if it had extended past a week.
Earlier this week Rep. Michelle Steel (R-CA) introduced the Safeguarding the Supply Chain Act, legislation that would place maritime labor under the Railway Labor Act. Doing so would require mediation efforts to be exhausted before port workers could undertake a labor strike. Such processes currently govern labor disputes for not only rail workers, but airline employees as well.
We will continue to monitor developments on the labor negotiations closely.
One-Year Extension for EUDR Compliance Provides Temporary Relief
The U.S. wood products sector received some good news Wednesday, when the European Commission announced a 12-month delay in implementation of EUDR, pushing the effective date for large companies to December 30, 2025. The proposal must first be adopted by both the EU Parliament and the EU Council, though most acts are adopted during the first reading.
The additional time is meant to provide impacted companies adequate time to phase in their solutions, ensuring smooth implementation from the start. The Commission noted that constant concerns expressed by global partners—including the U.S. government—regarding their ability to comply with EUDR’s requirements played a role in the delay. The EU Commission made clear that this extension in no way puts into question the objectives or the substance of the law.
As we mentioned last week, the EUDR has been creating near panic up and down the forestry/wood products supply chain as no entity can currently comply with its requirements for geolocation. The one-year delay—assuming it is enacted—is helpful, but the fact remains that tracing trees used to make wood building products back to the exact parcel where they were harvested is a tremendous hurdle and this requirement is a linchpin of the EU law. We will keep you apprised of developments.
Growing Calls for a Delay in Corporate Transparency Act Implementation
The upcoming Lame Duck session of Congress following the election—the last gasp of the 118th Congress—may include action on delaying implementation of the Corporate Transparency Act. As we have written about, this little-known law that takes effect next year imposes burdensome filing and recordkeeping requirements on small to medium-sized businesses. FinCen—the arm of the U.S. Department of Treasury in charge of implementing the CTA—came out last week with data showing the vast majority of businesses required to file under the CTA have not done so—despite just three months left before the year-end filing deadline. The fact of the matter is that compliance obligations have not been well communicated by FinCen and the chorus of policymakers calling for a one-year delay is growing. Penalties for non-compliance can be up to $590 per day and up to 2 years in jail.
