Semiannual Regulatory Agendas Include Rules Affecting Trade

(World Trade Interactive)

The May 5 issue of the Federal Register will include the semiannual regulatory agendas of a number of federal agencies. These agendas include updates on various rulemaking activities of interest to the trade community, as indicated below.

Department of Agriculture
• Country of origin labeling – The Agricultural Marketing Service expects to finalize in September regulations on the mandatory country of origin labeling of beef, pork, lamb, fish, perishable agricultural commodities and peanuts.

• Cattle imports – The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service expects to issue in July a proposed rule designed to help ensure that cattle and captive bison infected with tuberculosis are not imported into the U.S. This rule will establish several levels of risk classifications to be applied to foreign regions with regard to tuberculosis and establish requirements governing the importation of cattle and captive bison based on each risk classification.

A related proposed rule expected in December would amend the animal importation regulations to require that steers and spayed heifers with more than three inches of horn growth (which can be used as rodeo cattle, which are often maintained longer than feeder cattle) that are entering the U.S. from Mexico meet more stringent tuberculosis testing requirements than those with three inches or less. This rulemaking will replace a previously published proposed rule, which APHIS will withdraw.

• Plant imports – APHIS plans to issue in August a proposed rule that would establish a new category in the regulations governing the importation of nursery stock, also known as plants for planting. This category would list taxa of plants for planting whose importation is not authorized pending risk assessment.

• Fruit and vegetable imports – APHIS plans to issue in October a final rule requiring that a phytosanitary certificate accompany all non-commercial shipments of fruits and vegetables imported into the U.S. by air passengers.

• Imports from Canada – APHIS expects to finalize in June an August 2006 interim rule that amended the foreign quarantine and user fee regulations by eliminating (a) the exemptions from inspection for imported fruits and vegetables grown in Canada and (b) the exemptions from user fees for commercial vessels, trucks, railroad cars and aircraft (and international air passengers) entering the U.S from Canada.

• Export certification – APHIS anticipates issuing in September a final rule that increases the user fees charged for export certification of plants and plant products and adds a new user fee for federal export certificates for plants and plant products that an exporter obtains from a state or county cooperator.

• Bird and poultry imports – APHIS plans to issue this month an interim rule prohibiting or restricting the importation of birds, poultry and bird and poultry products from regions that have reported the presence in commercial birds or poultry of highly pathogenic avian influenza other than subtype H5N1. The new restrictions will be almost identical to those imposed on articles from regions with exotic Newcastle disease.

• Fish imports – APHIS expects to issue this month an interim final rule restricting the importation of live fish that are susceptible to viral hemorrhagic septicemia, a highly contagious disease of certain freshwater and saltwater fish.

Department of Health and Human Services
• Food labeling – The Food and Drug Administration plans to issue in July a proposed rule that would require imported food that is refused entry into the U.S. to be labeled “UNITED STATES: REFUSED ENTRY” by its owners or consignees.

Department of Homeland Security
• Security filing – U.S. Customs and Border Protection anticipates that it will issue in September a final “10+2” rule requiring additional data elements from importers and ocean carriers before oceanborne cargo is brought into the U.S.

• Air cargo screening – The Transportation Security Administration plans to issue in August an interim final rule establishing the Certified Cargo Screening Program, which will certify shippers, manufacturers and other entities to screen air cargo intended for transport on passenger aircraft. The CCSP will be the primary means through which the TSA will meet the statutory requirement for 100 percent of air cargo transported on passenger aircraft operated by an air carrier or foreign air carrier in air transportation or intrastate air transportation to be screened by August 2010. The TSA is currently pilot testing the CCSP in San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York and Seattle.

Department of Transportation
• Intermodal equipment – The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration expects to issue in September a final rule making intermodal equipment providers subject to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations for the first time. The pending regulations are intended to ensure that intermodal container chassis and trailers tendered to motor carriers by steamship lines, railroads, terminal operators, chassis pools, etc., are safe and systematically maintained.