ABSTRACT
The described temporary exports by OECD-based multi to China, Haiti, Mexico and other states, aimed at countering Western protectionism, are usually registered in the trade statistics as genuine exports. Numerous industrialists in the West would have liked their governments to ban competing imports of finished goods from the Less-developed countries, particularly those produced with relatively low labour costs. As the labour-intensive processes of cutting and stitching are the costly elements in the making of shoes, it proved worthwhile to export to Haiti US materials which returned home, incorporated within low-priced imports. There is a ruling that imports from Haiti and Mexico made with US-sourced materials, and are being 'returned' to the US, shall be assessed by the Customs only on their value-added. Tyson, one of the industrial giants of the Ruhr, was found to have shipped during a three-year period cold rolled steel which it had fraudulently described as a cheaper grade of steel to evade customs duty.
