The Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT) indicated in a May 10^th conference call with the Canadian Society of Customs Brokers (CSCB) that they will announce changes with regard to the number of export permits required, and that exporters will have the option to file consolidated weekly permits for each mill of origin.

The quality of the data collected by DFAIT will be the same as that currently collected, but the data will be consolidated as opposed to being provided on an individual basis. No changes to DFAIT’s system are envisioned, and the federal government’s permit price for the weekly permit will remain unchanged at $9.00

A "Notice to Exporters" is expected shortly, with the new weekly permit system to go into effect two weeks after. A reporting week will begin on a Saturday and run until the following Friday. Due to data restrictions required to track the manufacturer, the consolidated permits will be per "First Mill" source. Remanners and wholesalers who source from various mills will have to apply for weekly permits according to source, requiring more than one consolidated permit to be filed if more than one source.

Exporters shipping thirty loads a week from once source, for example, filing weekly-consolidated permits, will automatically save over a thousand dollars a month in export permit fees. Savings to the Canadian Broker/Permit Filer portion of the permit costs, previously based on a per shipment/permit basis, will most likely depend upon whether or not the exporter would or could provide the data to the broker/permit filer in a consolidated format. Otherwise the broker/permit filer would still have to receive singular shipment data and consolidate it, per mill, to a weekly report. Please contact your Canadian Broker/Permit Filer direct for more information about this ability and potential related savings.

Respectfully,

Michael D. Jones, President