Forced labour rules and cotton traceability: what US and EU clothing importers must prove

A garment sewn in Bangladesh can still be stopped at a US port if any of its cotton, yarn or fabric was produced in China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region or by a company on the US government's UFLPA Entity List. The law looks at every input, not the country where the garment was sewn. The importer must be able to show where the cotton was grown and who handled it at each step. This guide sets out what the US rules say, which documents trace a cotton garment from bale to carton, what happens when US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) detains a shipment, and how the EU's own forced labour ban will apply from 14 December 2027. It describes the rules and is not legal advice; confirm your own case with your customs broker or a trade lawyer.

Why a garment made in Bangladesh can still be detained

US forced labour law follows the materials. Section 307 of the Tariff Act covers goods made "wholly or in part" with forced labour, and the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) applies the same words to Xinjiang. A t-shirt cut and sewn in Narayanganj is "made in Bangladesh" for its country of origin marking, but if the jersey was knitted from yarn spun with Xinjiang cotton, the t-shirt contains an input the law presumes was made with forced labour.

The 2022 UFLPA Strategy, published by the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force, states that Xinjiang produces about one-fifth of the world's cotton, and that raw or processed materials such as cotton, thread or yarn may be shipped to another Chinese province or a third country for processing, where they can be mixed with inputs from elsewhere. Companies that buy from third countries, it warns, may be procuring goods from Xinjiang indirectly. The 2025 update of the Strategy keeps apparel and cotton and cotton products on its list of high-priority sectors for enforcement.

None of this means Bangladeshi garments contain Xinjiang cotton. It means a US importer has to be able to show that they do not, with records, if CBP asks.

Section 307 and withhold release orders

The older rule is Section 307 of the Tariff Act of 1930, 19 U.S.C. 1307. It bars entry to all goods mined, produced or manufactured wholly or in part in any foreign country by convict labour, forced labour or indentured labour under penal sanctions. The statute defines forced labour as work exacted from a person under the menace of a penalty, for which the worker has not offered himself voluntarily. A 2016 amendment removed the old exception for goods the United States could not produce in enough quantity itself, so there is no "consumptive demand" defence any more.

CBP enforces Section 307 case by case, on any country and any product:

• Withhold release order (WRO). Issued when CBP has reasonable suspicion that goods made with forced labour are being, or are likely to be, imported. It tells ports to detain the named goods.
• Finding. Issued when CBP has probable cause, with the approval of the Secretary of Homeland Security. A Finding allows CBP to seize the goods and start forfeiture unless the importer shows they were not made with forced labour. Findings are published in the Customs Bulletin and the Federal Register.

Before the UFLPA existed, CBP had already issued WROs on cotton from the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps and on all Xinjiang cotton and downstream products using it as an input, according to the 2022 Strategy. Check CBP's published list of WROs and Findings for every mill and supplier in your chain.

The UFLPA and its rebuttable presumption

The UFLPA is Public Law 117-78. Its rebuttable presumption took effect on 21 June 2022. CBP presumes that goods mined, produced or manufactured wholly or in part in Xinjiang, or by an entity on the UFLPA Entity List, are made with forced labour and are not entitled to entry. A rebuttable presumption is something treated as true unless proven otherwise, and the burden of proving otherwise sits with the importer.

The Entity List is maintained by the Department of Homeland Security's Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force and published in the Federal Register. It has four parts: entities in Xinjiang that produce goods with forced labour; entities working with the Xinjiang government to recruit or transfer forced labour; exporters of those entities' products from China to the United States; and facilities, including the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, that source material from Xinjiang or from government labour schemes. Entities are added over time, so check it for every order, not once.

CBP's 2026 operational guidance explains how it decides what to stop. A potential input is where information indicates goods may have been made in Xinjiang or by a listed entity; a direct input is where information indicates they were. Depending on how certain the link is, CBP may detain the shipment and ask for evidence, or exclude it outright.

Where Bangladesh's cotton, yarn and fabric come from

Bangladesh grows very little cotton. The US Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service (USDA FAS) reported in April 2026 that domestic production supplies less than 2 percent of the textile industry's demand. Bangladesh imported an estimated 8.05 million 480-pound bales in the 2024/25 marketing year. The same report gives the suppliers:

USDA also reports that local mills produce about 85 percent of the yarn needed for knitwear but only about 40 percent of the fabric used in woven garments. Two practical points follow. First, a knitted garment often starts with raw cotton imported by a Bangladeshi spinner, so the bale records sit one or two steps from the factory. Second, woven garments rely more on imported fabric, and most imported cotton fabric comes from China. USDA does not say where the cotton inside that fabric was grown, and that is precisely the question CBP asks. Fabric and yarn bought from China therefore carry a heavier documentation burden, however reliable the mill. Our guide to combed, carded and ring-spun cotton explains the spinning side.

The document chain from cotton bale to finished garment

CBP's 2026 guidance for importers, in its appendix on high-priority sectors, asks for cotton records that show the entire supply chain "from the origin of the cotton at the bale level" to the finished product. For apparel it asks for records tracing every stage, from fibre through spinning, knitting or weaving, dyeing and finishing, to cutting, sewing and export, with the location and role of each facility. It recommends a numbered flow chart with maps, each step matched to numbered supporting documents, and citations showing how you identified each upstream company you did not buy from directly.

CBP's list of supporting evidence also includes purchase orders and invoices for all suppliers and sub-suppliers, payment records, the seller's and buyer's inventory and warehouse receipts, affidavits from each company in the chain, and evidence that the volume of inputs matches the volume of output. That last point matters: if a spinner bought 100 tonnes of Brazilian cotton and sold 300 tonnes of yarn, its paperwork does not show which cotton went into your order.

Certificates help but do not replace this chain. A Textile Exchange transaction certificate, for example, is issued by the supplier's certification body and lists the certified products shipped, with the buyer's name and address. Textile Exchange itself notes that a certificate from the middle of the chain does not prove the chain is complete beyond the company that issued it. It also tracks certified content, such as organic or recycled fibre, rather than labour conditions. Learn how to check any certificate against the issuer's database in our guide to verifying factory certificates in Bangladesh.

What happens when CBP detains a shipment

CBP's 2026 guidance sets out the process for a UFLPA detention:

1. CBP issues a detention notice (CBP Form 6051D) stating the reason and how to submit evidence. The importer has 30 days to respond.
2. Within those 30 days the importer chooses: export or destroy the goods at its own cost, or request a review and upload evidence through CBP's Forced Labor Portal.
3. An applicability review argues that the goods have no input from Xinjiang or a listed entity. An exception review accepts that there is such an input and argues, by clear and convincing evidence, that no forced labour was used. The exception route also requires full compliance with the UFLPA Strategy's importer guidance.
4. Extensions are at CBP's discretion: at most two, and no more than 90 calendar days from the date of the detention notice in total.

The importer pays storage costs for the whole review, and CBP may require a single-transaction bond of three times the value of the detained goods. A brand that cannot produce bale-level records within those deadlines risks losing the shipment, so collect the records before the goods sail.

Isotopic testing and what audits count

Paper can be wrong, so CBP also describes isotopic testing. For cotton, the fibre carries an isotopic "fingerprint" set by the growing conditions, not by where the seed came from. Comparing a sample against a reference library shows whether the cotton is consistent with the origin claimed. CBP notes that the test is slow, needs specialist equipment, and does not work for every product; it encourages importers to build testing into due diligence early, and it does not endorse any particular laboratory. A result that supports your paperwork is useful evidence; it does not replace the paperwork.

On audits, CBP's guidance is specific: audits should be unannounced and carried out by independent auditors able to assess the International Labour Organization's 11 indicators of forced labour. CBP generally does not treat financial audits, environmental audits or audits that do not look at those indicators as enough. A standard social audit of the sewing factory covers one step of the chain, not the spinner or the cotton merchant. Our comparison of BSCI, WRAP, SMETA and SA8000 explains what each factory audit does cover, and our compliance and audits page shows how factory audits fit into an order.

The EU Forced Labour Regulation from 14 December 2027

Regulation (EU) 2024/3015 prohibits placing or making available on the EU market, or exporting, any product made with forced labour. It applies from 14 December 2027; a few provisions, including those on the risk database, have applied since 13 December 2024. A "product made with forced labour" is one where forced labour was used in whole or in part at any stage of extraction, harvest, production or manufacture, anywhere in the supply chain. Like the US law, it reaches the cotton field, not just the sewing line. Online sales targeted at end users in the EU count as making a product available.

The mechanics differ from the UFLPA:

• No presumption by region. Authorities follow a risk-based approach, prioritising by the scale and severity of suspected forced labour (including forced labour imposed by state authorities), the volume of products on the EU market, and the share of the suspect part in the final product.
• Who investigates. Where the suspected forced labour is outside the EU, as with cotton grown abroad, the European Commission leads. National authorities lead for cases inside the EU.
• How. Before opening an investigation, the authority asks the companies concerned what they have done to identify, prevent and end forced labour risks; they have 30 working days to reply. The authority then has to establish a violation from the evidence, and aims to decide within 9 months. If a company refuses information or obstructs the process, the authority may decide on the facts available.
• Consequences. A decision bans the product from the EU market and from export, orders its withdrawal, and orders its disposal, by recycling where possible. Decisions are recognised across member states, and customs authorities use them to stop matching products at the border.

The European Commission published its guidelines and the forced labour risk database in June 2026. For EU importers the lesson matches the US one: keep a traceable record of where your cotton came from, because a request for information comes with a deadline. Our page for EU brands covers the other rules that apply to clothing made in Bangladesh.

A checklist for buyers

• Ask, before you confirm the order, whether the yarn is spun in Bangladesh or imported, and whether the fabric is local or imported. Record the country for each.
• Get the names and addresses of the spinner, the fabric mill and any dye house, as well as the garment factory.
• Ask the spinner for the origin of the cotton lots used, with import documents for those lots.
• Check every name against the UFLPA Entity List and CBP's list of WROs and Findings, and repeat the check when the list is updated.
• Ask for production records that link lots through the chain: bale to yarn, yarn to fabric, fabric to cut order.
• Make record-keeping a written condition of the purchase order, including the right to request documents after shipment.
• For high-risk inputs, such as cotton fabric bought from China, consider isotopic testing before bulk production.
• Build one file per order, numbered to a flow chart, so it can be sent within days if CBP or an EU authority asks.
• Have your customs broker or trade lawyer review the file for your first US or EU shipment.

The wider import process, from HS codes to entry, is covered in our guide on how to import clothes from Bangladesh.

What to do next

Traceability is easiest to set up before fabric is booked, because that is when the spinner and mill are chosen. Our page for US brands explains how orders from Bangladesh reach the United States, and our fabric and trim sourcing service covers how fabric is selected. We name the factory making your order in writing before production, with its address, certificates and audit reports. Send us your product, quantities and destination market, and tell us which records your broker needs; we reply within one working day.