Jordan Supporting Statement

Supporting Statement

U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement

1651- 0128

1. Justification

1. On September 28, 2001 the United States-Jordan Free Trade Agreement (US-JFTA) was signed into law. The provisions of the US-JFTA were adopted with the enactment of the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act (“the Act”, Public Law 107-43). The Act implemented the agreement on December 17, 2001. The objectives of the US-JFTA are to establish free trade through the reduction and elimination of barriers, strengthen and develop economic relations, and to lay the foundation for further cooperation to expand and enhance benefits of the agreement. The collection identifies the country of origin and related rules that apply for purposes of duty-free or reduced-duty treatment on imported goods under the US-JFTA.

2. The information is to be used by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to document preferential tariff treatment under the provisions of the US-JFTA.

3. Information requested under the JFTA may be submitted via email or on electronic media to reduce the compliance burden on the public. Although only a low percentage of submissions are currently made electronically, it is anticipated that these numbers will increase over time.

4. Since each document is unique, this information is not duplicated elsewhere.

5. This collection of information does not significantly impact small businesses or entities.

6. If this information were not collected, CBP would be unable to enforce the documentary and procedural requirements that apply to claims for preferential tariff treatment under the US-JFTA.

7. This information collection is conducted in a manner consistent with the guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.5(c)(2).

8. Public comments were solicited in two Federal Register Notices- a 60-day notice on July 12, 2007, Volume 72, Page 38092 and on September 13, 2007, Volume 72, Page 52382. As of this submission, no comments have been received.

9. There is no offer of a monetary or material value for this information collection.

10. The US-JFTA supporting statement may contain trade secrets and commercial and financial information relating to the confidential business of private parties. This information will be contained in a safe location and only CBP employees with a “need to know” basis will have access.

11. This information collection does not involve questions of a personal or sensitive nature.

12. Estimated Annualized Burden on the Public. The estimated burden for this information collection is 500 hours, based on an estimated 2,500 respondents filing a total of 2,500 annual responses. Each response requires an estimated .2 hours (12 minutes) to complete.

Estimated Annualized Cost to the Public. The estimated cost to the respondents is $12,500 based on 500 burden hours at an average rate of $25.00 per hour.

13. Estimated Record Keeping Burden on the Public. There is no record keeping burden requirement associated with this collection.

Estimated Capitalization Cost Burden on the Public. There are no capitalization costs associated with this information collection.

14. Estimated Cost to the Federal Government. The estimated annual cost to the Federal Government in handling, processing and recording the information collected with regard to this collection is $15,000 based on an estimated 500 hours expended at an average rate of $30.00.

15. There are no program changes or adjustments made to this information collection.

16. This information will not be published for statistical purposes.

17. There is no form associated with this collection.

18. CBP does not request an exception to the certification of this information collection.

B. No statistical methods were employed.