The Agriculture Department is withdrawing a proposed rule issued in 2013 that would have overhauled the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service’s Lacey Act forfeiture regulations, it said in a notice. Under the withdrawn proposal, APHIS would have increased the threshold for referral to federal court to $15,000, provided for recovery of costs related to APHIS storage of seized merchandise, and set forth procedures for valuation of seized property and posting of seizure notices at the port, among other things. The withdrawal is one of several announced in the USDA notice that “were either published in the Federal Register more than 4 years ago without subsequent action or determined to no longer be candidates for final action,” USDA said. “USDA is taking this action to reduce its regulatory backlog and focus its resources on higher priority actions. The Department’s actions are part of an overall regulatory reform strategy to reduce regulatory burden on the public and to ensure the Spring and Fall 2017 Unified Agendas of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions provided the public accurate information about rulemakings the Department intends to undertake,” it said.

The Agricultural Marketing Service is proposing new late payment fees and interest charges on late assessments from importers and domestic producers under the honey marketing order. Under the order, importers and domestic handlers of 250,000 pounds of non-organic honey or honey products must pay an assessment. AMS is proposing to impose a late fee of an additional 10 percent on assessments not received within 30 calendar days of the date they are due, as well as 2/3 percent interest until payment is received. Comments are due Jan. 22.

The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service on Dec. 14 published a “major update” to the wood and wood products section of its Miscellaneous and Processed Products Import Manual, it said in an emailed update. The update “does not change APHIS’ import requirements for wood and wood products; it simply makes them easier to find and understand,” the agency said. Changes include reorganizing requirements into subsections, placing information in shorter tables, removing redundant language that already appears on permits and creating a new section with guidance on importing wooden handicrafts. The revision is “part of a larger 18-month effort to clarify agency guidance and improve communication with both APHIS stakeholders and [CBP] inspectors on wood and wood product requirements,” APHIS said.

The Agricultural Marketing Service is amending its U.S. Standards for Grades of Carcass Beef, in a final rule, “to allow dentition and documentation of actual age as additional methods of classifying maturity of carcasses presented to [the U.S. Department of Agriculture] for official quality grading,” it said. Current standards include only skeletal and muscular evidence as a determination of classifying maturity of carcasses for the purposes of official USDA quality grading, AMS had said in its underlying proposal issued in June (see 1706160030). The final rule takes effect Dec. 18.

The Agriculture Department is amending its regulations to increase its civil monetary penalty amounts to account for inflation, it said in a final rule. Affected penalties include fines for violating Agricultural Marketing Service marketing orders and the provisions of the Plant Protection Act, as enforced by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. The final rule takes effect Dec. 5.

The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service will allow imports of fresh mangoes from Vietnam into the continental U.S., it said in a final rule. Importation will be subject to conditions, including orchard or packinghouse requirements, irradiation treatment and port of entry inspection, APHIS said. The mangoes must also be accompanied by a phytosanitary certificate from the Vietnamese government with an additional declaration that the fruit is free of certain pests. The final rule takes effect Dec. 29.

The Agricultural Marketing Service is relaxing minimum size requirements for imported grapefruit and grapefruit grown in Florida, it said in an interim rule. Effective Nov. 24, AMS will allow importation of grapefruits with a diameter of at least 3 inches, instead of the previous minimum size requirement of 3 5/16 inches, the agency said. The change to the marketing order on oranges, grapefruits, pomelos and tangerines comes in response to a recommendation by the Citrus Administrative Committee after Hurricane Irma damaged the Florida crop in September. AMS will consider comments on the change received by Jan. 22. The citrus committee also recommended a relaxation of minimum size requirements for oranges, which AMS will consider “under a separate action,” the agency said.

The Agricultural Marketing Service is further postponing until May 14, 2018, the effective date of changes to its organic livestock and poultry production requirements. The agency's January final rule adds new provisions on livestock handling and transport for slaughter and avian living conditions, and expands and clarifies “existing requirements covering livestock care and production practices and mammalian living conditions," AMS said (see 1701180085). The effective date had already been delayed until May from its original March effective date, and then again postponed until Nov. 14 (see 1705090024). The delay will give AMS time to issue another proposed rule and seek additional comments, it said.

The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is withdrawing a proposed rule that would have overhauled its regulations on importation and interstate movement of genetically engineered (GE) organisms. The agency will “re-engage with stakeholders to determine the most effective, science-based approach for regulating the products of modern biotechnology while protecting plant health,” it said in a press release. The agency’s January 2017 proposal would have eliminated time-limited permits in favor of increased recordkeeping requirements, and changed how the agency decides whether to regulate a GE organism (see 1701180058). “Many commenters objected to the scope of the proposed rule. Some thought that our criteria for designating GE organisms as regulated organisms were too expansive, potentially resulting in our regulating a wider range of GE organisms than necessary and thereby increasing, rather than reducing, the regulatory burden for the biotechnology industry,” the agency said in its notice of withdrawal.

The Department of Agriculture's Commodity Credit Corporation on Nov. 2 announced Special Import Quota #2 for upland cotton will be established on Nov. 9, allowing importation of 12,803,341 kilograms (58,805 bales) of upland cotton. It will apply to upland cotton purchased not later than Feb. 7, 2018, and entered into the U.S. by May 7, 2018. The quota is equivalent to one week's consumption of cotton by domestic mills at the seasonally adjusted average rate for the period June 2017 through August 2017, the most recent three months for which data is available.