The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service will allow importers a few more months before it begins rejecting copies of phytosanitary certificates for plant commodities, it said Dec. 29. The agency had previously said it would end the policy of accepting copies Jan. 1 (see 2112100059), but now says it will begin accepting only originals on March 31. The policy is in place to mitigate challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service announced the 2022 rates it will charge meat and poultry establishments, egg products plants, and importers and exporters for providing voluntary, overtime and holiday inspection and identification, certification and laboratory services. Effective Jan. 2, the agency's basetime rate will be $67, and its overtime rate $82.60. The 2022 holiday rate will be $98.20, and the laboratory rate will be $85.72. FSIS said the export application fee will be $4.01 per application, unchanged from last year's fee.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service will classify Canada as having Level I risk for both bovine tuberculosis and brucellosis, it said in a notice released Dec. 23. Level I is the least restrictive level in APHIS’s bovine importation scheme, and allows imports of sexually intact bovines without a certificate or other restrictions. Imports under this classification may be authorized beginning Dec. 27.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is proposing to allow importation of pummelo from Vietnam into the United States, subject to certain phytostanitary requirements, it said in a notice released Dec. 23. Comments are due Feb. 25.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Commodity Credit Corporation announced Dec. 16 that Special Import Quota #9 for upland cotton will be established Dec. 23, allowing importation of 9,434,076 kilograms (43,330 bales) of upland cotton, the same as the previous quota period. The quota will apply to upland cotton purchased not later than March 22, 2022, and entered into the U.S. by June 20, 2022. The quota is equivalent to one week's consumption of cotton by domestic mills at the seasonally adjusted average rate for the August through October 2021 period, the most recent three months for which data is available.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Commodity Credit Corporation announced Dec. 9 that Special Import Quota #8 for upland cotton will be established Dec. 16, allowing importation of 9,434,076 kilograms (43,330 bales) of upland cotton, the same as the previous quota period. The quota will apply to upland cotton purchased not later than March 15, 2022, and entered into the U.S. by June 13, 2022. The quota is equivalent to one week's consumption of cotton by domestic mills at the seasonally adjusted average rate for the August through October 2021 period, the most recent three months for which data is available.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection will no longer accept copies of phytosanitary certificates and forms as of Jan. 1, it said. The agency had been accepting copies to ease burdens on importers of plant commodities during the COVID-19 pandemic, but will as of the new year only accept original phytosanitary certificates, APHIS said. APHIS also will still continue to accept electronic phytosanitary certificates shared government-to-government through the ePhyto system for participating countries, and “a paper certificate would not need to be presented for cargo clearance by U.S. officials if the certificate is an ePhyto with a proper declaration in the APHIS Core message set using the PG13/14 code AE1,” the agency said.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Commodity Credit Corporation announced Dec. 2 that Special Import Quota #7 for upland cotton will be established Dec. 9, allowing importation of 9,434,076 kilograms (43,330 bales) of upland cotton, down from 10,024,400 kilograms (46,041 bales) in the previous quota period. The quota will apply to upland cotton purchased not later than March 8, 2022, and entered into the U.S. by June 6, 2022. The quota is equivalent to one week's consumption of cotton by domestic mills at the seasonally adjusted average rate for the August through October 2021 period, the most recent three months for which data is available.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is amending its regulations on imports of sheep and goats to remove bovine spongiform encephalopathy-related import restrictions. The agency’s final rule, released Dec. 2, ends BSE restrictions on live sheep and goats and most sheep and goat products. APHIS said the restrictions were originally put in place prior to “extensive research” that shows sheep and goats “pose a minimal risk of spreading BSE.” At the same time, APHIS is updating its scrapie requirements for importing live sheep and goats and their germplasm, requiring that any live sheep or goats not transported directly to slaughter, or to a designated feedlot and then to slaughter, must originate from a scrapie-free country or flock with a herd certification program equivalent to the U.S. Scrapie Flock Certification Program. APHIS is also adding transmissible spongiform encephalopathy import restrictions for certain wild, zoological and other non-bovine ruminant species, and will allow imports of such species on a case-by-case basis. The final rule takes effect Jan. 3, 2022.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Commodity Credit Corporation announced Nov. 26 that Special Import Quota #6 for upland cotton will be established Dec. 2, allowing importation of 10,024,400 kilograms (46,041 bales) of upland cotton, the same as the previous quota period. The quota will apply to upland cotton purchased not later than March 1, 2022, and entered into the U.S. by May 30, 2022. The quota is equivalent to one week's consumption of cotton by domestic mills at the seasonally adjusted average rate for the July through September 2021 period, the most recent three months for which data is available.