CIT Rules Beta-Carotene Product Classified as Dietary Supplement, Not General Provitamin
The Court of International Trade ruled Aug. 13, in a decision made public Sept. 5, that exporter BASF Corp.’s food additive Betatene was properly classified under Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 2106 as a dietary supplement.
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CIT Judge Lisa Wang said that the products weren’t general-use “provitamins,” as BASF argued (see 2504090063), because the preparation they underwent for tableting made them not suitable for general commercial use.
The U.S. described Betatene in its briefing as a form of beta-carotene, “a naturally occurring form of provitamin A that gives carrots and pumpkins their distinctive orange color” (see 2501150089). To prepare Betatene for sale, Wang explained, the product undergoes microencapsulation, a process by which its ingredients are turned into “beadlets” that can survive further transformation into tablets. It is then sold by BASF “for use as a provitamin A source in vitamin and dietary supplement tablets and hard capsules.”
Wang first considered, based on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit case Roche Vitamins, Inc. v. United States, whether the Betatene entries could be classified as provitamins according to Explanatory Note EN 29.36. The note requires that, first, the products’ manufacturing process can’t impact the products’ “functionality as provitamin A,” and, second, added stabilizing agents can’t render the beta-carotene “particularly suitable for specific use rather than general use.”
In Roche, CAFC saw no evidence that added stabilizers made BetaTab, the product at issue in that case, “particularly suitable for tableting,” Wang observed.
In this case, however, the microencapsulation process for Betatene does make it “particularly suitable for tableting,” she said. She noted that, “[f]urther, Betatene is marketed and optimized for tablets,” something BASF didn’t dispute.
Microencapsulation also means that Betatene isn’t suitable for “beta-carotene’s remaining commercial uses” because it would first have to be “de-formulated from its microencapsulated beadlet, which is not commercially or functionally viable,” she said.
She also determined that it did properly fall under heading 2106. The product is a “food” because it is meant to be ingested, she said. And it's “not ‘elsewhere specified or included,’” she said, meaning it properly fits under the “other” category in that heading.
(BASF Corp. v. United States, Slip Op. 25-105, CIT # 12-00422, dated 08/13/25; Judge: Lisa Wang; Attorneys: Frederic Van Arnam of Barnes Richardson for plaintiff BASF Corp.; Luke Mathers for defendant U.S. government)