CBP Officials Discuss Agriculture Issues at February COAC Meeting
During the February 25, 2010 Departmental Advisory Committee on Commercial Operations of U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Related Homeland Security Functions (COAC) meeting, a CBP official and COAC's Agriculture Subcommittee provided an update on agricultural issues. Highlights of this update include:
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COAC and CBP Discuss Importance of Adequate Agriculture Staffing
A COAC member stressed the need for CBP to have adequate staffing for its agricultural mission, given its labor-intensive nature.
A CBP official agreed on the importance of adequate staffing and noted that CBP will be facing challenges in fiscal year 2011 since the drop in trade has resulted in a decrease in user fee revenue.
The official also noted that one third of its Field Operations positions are funded by user fees.
(CBP's FY 2011 budget request recognizes the impact of a reduction in user fee revenue and requests $44.8 million to fund 318 CBP Officers plus support personnel to offset the impact of a decline in revenues from inspection user fees.)
The FY 2011 budget request for CBP also notes that in FY 2010, CBP plans to create a CBP Agriculture Specialist risk-based resource allocation and optimization model for assisting in deployment for CBP Agriculture Specialists and CBP agricultural canine resources at the ports of entry.)
New CBP Agricultural Representatives in CA and FL
According to a CBP official, CBP will be adding a representative from the Office of Field Operations in Sacramento, CA and Gainesville, FL to work with U.S. Department of Agriculture and State agriculture representatives. These new positions are intended to address CBP's connectivity gap with two large agricultural States. CBP is very close to filling the Sacramento position and has recently posted its vacancy announcement for the Gainesville position.
CBP-APHIS Stakeholders Conference Expected in Summer 2010
CBP officials state that they are trying to schedule another APHIS-CBP conference in the summer of 2010 in Washington, DC. At this conference, CBP plans to provide a progress report on its agriculture mission and discuss its future plans. CBP responded to a COAC request by agreeing to provide a Lacey Act update at the conference.
(The first such APHIS-CBP conference was held in summer 2008. According to CBP, that conference resulted in a very comprehensive action plan that CBP has been following since the conference.)
Questionnaire Almost Ready for Agriculture Stakeholders
COAC's Agriculture Subcommittee stated that they are almost ready to distribute a questionnaire that will be sent to agriculture stakeholders in order to get feedback on improving communication.
According to the Subcommittee, the survey will include questions asking stakeholders about the types of information (e.g., on trends, analysis, etc.) that is availablefrom CBP and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
(See ITT's Online Archives or 05/27/08 news, 08052721, for BP summary of USDA highlights from the 2008 conference
See ITT's Online Archives or 02/02/10 and 03/04/10 news, 10020210 and 10030420, for previous BP summaries on CBP's FY 2011 budget request.)