TAPP Applauds Addition of Exploitive Companies to Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act’s Prohibited Entities List

Recently, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) added two new entities to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) Entity List—a steel firm and an aspartame manufacturer.

Signed into law in 2021, the UFLPA is meant to counter the Chinese government's use of Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities to perform forced labor in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) of China (pictured in red on the map below). The UFLPA provides that any products or goods mined, produced, or manufactured in the XUAR or by an entity on the UFLPA Entity List are banned from U.S. importation.

The bipartisan passage of the UFLPA signaled that the United States is strongly committed to enforcing forced labor laws and that the United States will not be a party to the exploitation of oppressed peoples.

The UFLPA spurs American businesses to understand and examine their supply chains and to help eradicate forced labor from the global economy. Fully enforcing the UFLPA projects American human rights principles to the world and allows the United States to use trade policy for the betterment of humankind while strengthening our domestic economy.

This is why TAPP applauds ongoing DHS efforts to identify exploitive companies and add them to the UFLPA Entity List.