Country of Origin

Country of origin is the country where a good was grown, produced, or last 'substantially transformed' into a new article with a different name, character, or use — not simply the country it shipped from. It is the single most important fact on an entry because it decides which tariff column applies (MFN/Column 1 for normal-trade-relations countries versus the punitive Column 2 rate for Russia, Belarus, Cuba, and North Korea) and whether country-specific programs like Section 301 (China) attach. Example: cotton fabric woven in China but cut and fully assembled into shirts in Vietnam is Vietnamese-origin, so it escapes the 7.5%-100% Section 301 China duties even though the raw material came from China. Get origin wrong and you either overpay duty or expose yourself to CBP penalties and back-duty for misdeclaration, which is why substantial-transformation analysis is the foundation of any duty-savings or tariff-engineering strategy.