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Altana’ s pilot project with US CBP has drawn in large shippers like LL Bean and BASF. Matt Gush / Shutterstock. com

Increased supply chain scrutiny at odds with customs enforcement capability

By Eric Johnson

Increasing trade regulations in various countries are putting a burden on customs agencies that most are unable to cope with because those agencies lack the ability to effectively scrutinize product components and suppliers involved in complex supply chains.

US Customs and Border Protection( CBP) is at the forefront of this challenge, given the scrutiny that import supply chains are receiving under the Trump administration. But the US is far from the only key trade country that has increased such scrutiny on importers and exporters.

“ The key thing to call out is these trade policies are compelling the border agencies to scrutinize the supply chain network beyond their own borders into extraterritorial regulations,” Evan Smith, CEO of trade software vendor Altana, told the Journal of Commerce.

Essentially, a government’ s ability to dictate whether a product faces higher duties based on the place where a subcomponent or material of that product was placed is a new and growing challenge, Smith said.

“ Any government has the ability to say what happens within its borders, but what’ s new is deciding that what happens in other countries can be enforced at your borders,” he said.

Regulations such as the EU’ s carbon border adjustment mechanism or China’ s export controls on rare earth minerals should be thought of as in the same realm as US component-based tariffs and forced labor restrictions, according to Smith.

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The major constraint on CBP and other customs authorities is that the data provided in a customs entry filing can’ t support what CBP needs given its task of understanding the origin of product materials.

“ The customs process has been built around transactions,” Smith said.“ A shipment arrives, duties are paid and it’ s released or not. But the customs process is literally breaking in this environment.”

Smith said, for instance, that the Automated Broker Interface, which customs brokers use to file entries with CBP, can’ t receive information about the entire supply chain network responsible for a shipment.

“ It’ s a goods description with a HS code [ used to classify goods for international shipping ],” and other characteristics, he said.“ That level is insufficient for CBP to make a determination about the value chain network of the goods, where was it made, what are its component parts.”

Altana has been working with CBP on a public-private partnership that would enable CBP to digest that data before goods even hit a port or airport— sometimes even before a product has been manufactured— by allowing importers to proactively convey information related to the manufacturing and transportation of the product.

That partnership became what Altana calls Product Passports, which Smith likens to Global Entry for goods. Maersk, LL Bean, BASF, and a range of apparel manufacturers, chemical companies, retailers and automotive suppliers are already using the product, which Altana released publicly in early November.

32 Journal of Commerce | December 1, 2025 www. joc. com