The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service issued emails May 14, 2012, announcing changes to some Plant Protection and Quarantine (PPQ) electronic manuals. While some changes are minor, other changes may affect the admissibility of the plant products, including fruits, vegetables, and flowers.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service reports that the monographs for the toxicological evaluation of the veterinary drugs (Amoxicillin, Apramycin, Derquantel, Monensin, Monenpental, Narasin, and Triclabendazole), evaluated at the 75th meeting of the Joint Food and Agriculture Organization / World Health Organization Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) in Rome on November 7-18, 2011, are now available on the FAO website here, and the WHO website here. Draft maximum residues limits (MRLs) for these compounds will be considered at the 20th Session of Codex Committee on Residues of Veterinary Drugs in Foods (CCRVDF).
The Phytosanitary Certificate and Issuance Tracking (PCIT) system is now fully operational, the Animal and Plant Health and Inspection Service reported an email received by ITT at about 10:40 pm on May 14, 2012. APHIS said network operations at the U.S. Department of Agriculture hosting facility have been restored.
The National Organic Program will allow the use of two substances, fenbendazole and moxidectin in emergency treatment for organic dairy and breeder livestock. The Agricultural Marketing Service’s final rule, which is effective May 16, 2012, amends the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances1 at 7 CFR 205.603(a)(18) to add use exemptions for the two substances when organic system plan-approved preventative management does not prevent infestation, with the following restrictive annotations2: (1) fenbendazole is only for use by or on the lawful written order of a licensed veterinarian; and (2) moxidectin is for control of internal parasites only.
The Agricultural Marketing Service published a final rule establishing the Processed Raspberry Promotion, Research, and Information Order. Under the Order, producers of raspberries for processing and importers of processed raspberries will pay an assessment of up to one cent per pound ($0.022 / kg), with the initial assessment being one cent per pound, which will be paid to the National Processed Raspberry Council. This final rule is effective May 9, 2012, but collection of assessments and applicable reporting and recordkeeping will begin September 5, 2012.
On May 10, 2012, the Foreign Agricultural Service issued the following GAIN reports:
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service issued emails May 14, 2012, announcing changes to some Plant Protection and Quarantine (PPQ) electronic manuals. While some changes are minor, other changes may affect the admissibility of the plant products, including fruits, vegetables, and flowers.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service said the Codex Committee on Pesticide Residues (CCPR) held its 44th Session on April 23-28 in Shanghai, China. FSIS said about 300 representatives from 182 countries and regions attended the meeting. According to FSIS, the Session resulted in the following:
The Agricultural Marketing Service released a new publicly available web service for its Livestock Mandatory Reporting (LMR) system. According to AMS, this web service: offers easier access to all historical LMR data; follows commonly accepted technical standards for the automated retrieval of historical data sets by end-users; and allows users to pull large amounts of customized data sets automatically or on-demand. AMS said the Livestock Mandatory Reporting program facilitates price discovery and "provides all market participants, both large and small, with comparable levels of market information for cattle, swine, sheep, beef and lamb meat." The web service is in the tools section at the bottom left of this webpage.
On May 10, 2012, the Foreign Agricultural Service issued the following GAIN reports: