Other Government Agencies Plan New Import and Export Regs in Spring Unified Agenda
Federal agencies recently released the Spring 2014 Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions. The agenda provides a rough (though non-binding) timeline for agency regulatory actions during the coming year. Scheduled rulemakings for “other government agencies” involved in import regulation like the Agriculture Department and Environmental Protection Agency include changes to dairy tariff-rate quotas and standards on wood packing materials from Canada and composite wood formaldehyde standards. Meanwhile, the Food and Drug Administration remains embroiled in implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act, and the Consumer Product Safety Commission continues its work to implement safety standards, as well as changes to certificates of compliance.
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(NOTE: This is not an exhaustive list of import/export related regulations scheduled in the Unified Agenda. Many regulations appear in every edition of the agenda and are continually postponed. The rules listed below reflect new additions and notable changes from past agendas. See the full Unified Agenda for more detail.)
Food and Drug Administration
FDA’s regulatory agenda follows the schedule for its Food Safety Modernization Act rules the agency agreed to in February to settle a court challenge (see 14022124). FDA says it intends to issue its final rules on preventative controls for human and animal food in August 2016, its final rule on the Foreign Supplier Verification Program in October 2015, and its sanitary transportation proposed rule in March 2016. The agency is also for the first time scheduling proposed updates to its safety regulations for certain over-the-counter drugs to align its requirements with Canada’s.
Consumer Product Safety Commission
The CPSC has several regulatory changes in the pipeline that for the first time have reached final rule stage. The agenda says CPSC staff will be done drafting its final rule on certificates of compliance in December, despite a recently-announced delay in finalizing the regulations due to the need to request more comments (see 14050702). CPSC’s regulatory agenda also says the agency intends to begin considering safety standards for frame child carriers and residential garage door openers in the coming months.
Agriculture Department
The USDA’s regulatory agenda pushes back proposed changes to dairy tariff-rate quotas first proposed by the Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) in 2013. It also includes another delay to the perpetually-postponed changes to the Animal Plant Health and Inspection Service’s plant pest regulations, and for the first time a Food Safety and Inspection final rule to begin taking responsibility for catfish inspections.
Dairy TRQ amendments delayed. FAS is pushing back its target date for issuing a proposed rule to amend the dairy import licensing program. FAS asked for comments in February 2013 on possible changes to dairy tariff-rate quotas (TRQs), including provisions on license issuance procedures, historical licenses, license fee assessments, and reallocations (see 13020515). The agency had planned on issuing its proposed rule in November 2013, but now says it will come out in June (here).
Plant pest proposal postponed. APHIS is pushing back until September its timeline for issuing proposed revisions to its general plant pest regulations (here). The agency says the changes would regulate biological control organisms, allow shipments of some kinds of plant pests without restriction if exceptions or granted, and revise current regulations on the movement of soil.
PHIS implementation pushed back. APHIS is also delaying its final rules to automate electronic import inspection and certification (here) and export certification (here) until May and July, respectively. The proposed rules are part of the implementation of APHIS’ electronic Public Health Information System
Canada WPM exemption set to end in July. APHIS now plans to issue its final rule on Canadian wood packaging material in July (here). Under changes first proposed in 2010, the final rule would remove the current exemption for Canadian wood packaging material from normal treatment and marking requirements (see 10120215).
AQI fee hike scheduled for December. Finally, APHIS said it intends to finalize its Agricultural Quarantine and Inspection (AQI) fee increases in December (here). In April, APHIS proposed to increase fees on overtime and general AQI activities, as well as set fees on activities that previously weren’t covered (see 14042321).
FSIS moves toward catfish inspection. A new item from FSIS on the Unified Agenda is a final rule on catfish inspection, currently due in December (here). FSIS is currently in the process of assuming catfish inspection duties from FDA, and issued its proposed regulations in 2011 (see 11022424).
Environmental Protection Agency
EPA is still expecting to issue its final regulations on formaldehyde emissions standards for composite wood products in the early fall (see 13060715).. EPA says it now plans to finalize its regulations in October (here), alongside a related final rule setting third-party certification standards (here). EPA also says it plans to finalize its proposed revisions to export requirements for cathode ray tubes at about the same time (here).
Hazardous waste revisions. According to EPA’s regulatory agenda, a proposed rule is still coming on import-export requirements for hazardous waste. The proposed regulations would allow electronic submittal of all export and import-related documents, and enable electronic validation of export shipments, says EPA. The agency says the proposed rule should be coming in February 2015, instead of October 2014 as it had planned in its previous agenda.