The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) is accepting public comments through October 29, 2026, on significant foreign barriers to U.S. exports of goods and services, U.S. foreign direct investment, and U.S. electronic commerce. The submissions will inform the 2027 National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers (NTE Report). The request for comments was published in the Federal Register on September 14, 2026 (91 Fed. Reg. 58247) under docket number USTR-2026-0498.
Statutory Basis
Section 181 of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 U.S.C. § 2241) requires USTR to identify and analyze, each year, significant foreign trade barriers and practices that distort trade, and to report its findings to the President and Congress by March 31. The NTE Report is that annual report. Responses to this notice will also inform USTR's annual review under Section 1377 of the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988 (19 U.S.C. § 3106), which examines whether foreign governments that are parties to telecommunications trade agreements with the United States are meeting their obligations or are denying U.S. suppliers mutually advantageous market opportunities.
Barrier Categories
The notice organizes comments into fifteen categories. The most significant change from the prior year is a category devoted to duty evasion, circumvention, and transshipment. That category reaches persistent undervaluation or misclassification of traded goods or services, smuggling, temporary import schemes, transshipment, government policies that support or fund duty evasion, and failures by foreign governments to take effective action against evasion and transshipment through third countries.
The remaining categories are:
Import policies, including tariffs and other import charges, quantitative restrictions, import licensing, customs barriers, shortcomings in trade facilitation and customs valuation practices, and tax policies affecting the competitiveness of U.S. exports;
Technical barriers to trade, including unnecessarily restrictive standards, labeling, conformity assessment procedures, and technical regulations;
Sanitary and phytosanitary measures applied beyond the extent necessary to protect human, animal, or plant life or health, or maintained without sufficient scientific evidence;
Government procurement restrictions, including policies that exclude U.S. goods or services and bidding processes that lack transparency;
Intellectual property protection, including inadequate patent, copyright, trade secret, and trademark regimes and weak enforcement;
Services, including restrictions on foreign participation, discriminatory licensing and regulatory standards, and local presence requirements;
Investment, including foreign equity caps, local content, joint venture, technology transfer, and export performance requirements, and restrictions on repatriation of earnings, capital, fees, and royalties;
Subsidies, including export subsidies that displace U.S. exports in third country markets and import substitution subsidies contingent on the use of domestic goods;
Anticompetitive practices, including government tolerated anticompetitive conduct, abuse of competition laws to inhibit trade, and due process concerns in competition proceedings;
State owned enterprises whose conduct, or government treatment of them, significantly distorts U.S. exports or investment;
Other non-market policies and practices, including industrial plans targeting specific sectors for domestic dominance, pressure to purchase domestic products over U.S. imports, and the creation or maintenance of non-market excess capacity;
Labor, including significant violations of internationally recognized labor rights and practices that suppress wages and affect trade or investment flows;
Environment, including weak or unenforced environmental laws, illegal harvesting and trade of natural resources, and other practices that confer an advantage on producers or investors; and
Other barriers, including bribery and corruption and barriers that span several categories or affect a single sector.
USTR states that it is particularly interested in practices that may violate U.S. trade agreements, new or updated information on barriers described in the 2026 NTE Report, and information on barriers not previously reported.
Estimates of Trade Impact
To the extent possible, each comment should estimate the potential increase in U.S. exports, U.S. foreign direct investment, or U.S. electronic commerce that would result from removing the identified barrier, and should describe the methodology used. USTR asks that estimates be stated within one of four ranges: less than $25 million; $25 million to $100 million; $100 million to $500 million; or more than $500 million.
Markets Covered
The notice identifies 76 export markets: Algeria, Angola, the Arab League, Argentina, Australia, The Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Brunei, Cambodia, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Côte d'Ivoire, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Ethiopia, the European Union, Ghana, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Korea, Kuwait, Laos, Libya, Malaysia, Mexico, Moldova, Morocco, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Türkiye, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Vietnam. USTR will also accept comments on barriers in markets not listed.
Submission Requirements
Comments must be filed through Regulations.gov under docket USTR-2026-0498 no later than 11:59 p.m. EDT on Thursday, October 29, 2026. Hand delivered submissions are not accepted. Submissions must be in English, preferably as an attached Microsoft Word or PDF file. The first page should be headed "Comments Regarding Foreign Trade Barriers to U.S. Exports for 2027 Reporting," followed by the name of the country or countries addressed. USTR asks each commenter to file a single submission, with a separate attachment for each country discussed.
Business confidential information may be submitted if the filer certifies that the information is confidential and would not customarily be released to the public. The file name of the confidential version must begin with "BCI," each page containing confidential information must be marked "BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL," and a public version must be filed with a file name beginning with "P." Non-confidential submissions will be posted on the public docket. Filers unable to use Regulations.gov must contact USTR at ForeignTradeBarriersReport@ustr.eop.gov or (202) 395-3475 before the deadline to arrange an alternative method.
Source: Office of the United States Trade Representative, Request for Comments on Significant Foreign Trade Barriers for the 2027 National Trade Estimate Report, 91 Fed. Reg. 58247 (Sept. 14, 2026).