DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
Foreign-Trade Zones Board
[Docket No. 7-85]
50 FR 16329
April 25, 1985
Foreign-Trade Zone 29, Louisville, KY; Application for Subzone IBM
Typewriter & Printer Plant, Lexington
TEXT: An application has been submitted to the Foreign-Trade Zones Board
(the Board) by the Louisville and Jefferson County Riverport Authority,
grantee of Foreign-Trade Zone 29, requesting special-purpose subzone status
for the typewriter and printer manufacturing plant of International Business
Machines Corporation (IBM) in Lexington, Kentucky, some 75 miles east of
Louisville. The application was submitted pursuant to the provisions of the
Foreign-Trade Zones Act, as amended (19 U.S.C. 81a-81u), and the regulations
of the Board (15 CFR Part 400). It was formally filed on April 2, 1985. The
applicant is authorized to make this proposal under section 65.530(b) of the
Kentucky Revised Statutes. The adjacency requirement will be considered by
Customs.
The subzone would be located at IBM's plant at New Circle and Newton
Roads, Lexington, Kentucky. The 407-acre facility, which employs 6,000
persons, is used to produce home and office-use typewriters, keyboards,
printers and supplies. Up to 5 percent of the plant's components are
purchased from abroad, including motors, power supplies, electronic
components, and a variety of mechanical parts. Some 19 percent of the
finished products are expected to be exported in the current year.
Zone procedures would allow IBM to avoid duty payment on the foreign
components it uses in its exports. On its domestic sales, the company will
be able to take advantage of the same duty rate available to importers. The
duty rates on the parts IBM uses ranges from 4.1 to 11.9 percent (average
5.3 percent). Typewriters are duty-free. Keyboards and printers are
dutiable at 4.0 and 3.0 percent, respectively. Zone procedures will thus
help the plant become more competitive with manufacturing facilities abroad.
In accordance with the Board's regulations, an examiners committee has
been appointed to investigate the application and report to the Board. The
committee consists of: Dennis Puccinelli (Chairman), Foreign-Trade Zones
Staff, U.S. Department of Commerce, Washington, DC 20230; John F. Nelson,
District Director, U.S. Customs Service, North Central Region, Plaza Nine
Bldg., 6th Floor, 55 Erieview Plaza, Cleveland, OH 44114; and Colonel
Dwayne G. Lee, District Engineer, U.S. Army Engineer District Louisville,
P.O. Box 59, Louisville, KY 40201.
Comments concerning the proposed subzone are invited in writing from
interested persons and organizations. They should be addressed to the
Board's Executive Secretary at the address below and postmarked on or
before May 23, 1985.
A copy of the application is available for public inspection at each
of the following locations:
U.S. Dept. of Commerce District Office,
U.S. Post Office and Courthouse Bldg.,
Room 636B,
Louisville, KY 40202
Office of the Executive Secretary,
Foreign-Trade Zones Board,
U.S. Department of Commerce, Room 1529,
14th and Pennsylvania, NW.,
Washington, DC 20230
Dated: April 19, 1985.
John J. Da Ponte, Jr.,
Executive Secretary.
[FR Doc. 85-10002 Filed 4-24-85; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-25-M