The Food Safety and Inspection Service said the Regional Committee on North America & South West Pacific (CCNASWP) is requesting comments by June 22, 2012, on national food control systems, consumer participation in food standards setting, and the use of Codex standards at the national level. Details follow:

The Farm Service Agency issued a notice specifying the fee schedule, effective April 4, 2012, for the new Export Food Aid Commodities (EFAC) licensing agreement offered by the FSA under the U.S. Warehouse Act (USWA). Agricultural products that may be stored under an EFAC licensing agreement include, but are not limited to, corn soy blend, vegetable oil, and pulses such as peas, beans, and lentils.

The Food Safety and Inspection Service reports that the 6th session of the Codex Committee on Contaminants in Food met on March 26-30 in the Netherlands, and the 27th Session of the Codex Committee on General Principles met on April 2-6 in France. The Committees discussed risk analysis principles on contaminants in animal feed, and a discussion on why standards are held at Step 8 rather than adopted. Details of the meetings follow:

The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is requesting comments by May 7, 2012, on its risk analysis and draft phytosanitary measures for the importation into the continental U.S. of fresh litchi, longan, and rambutan fruit from the Philippines, which is currently not allowed. After reviewing the comments, if the overall conclusions of the risk analysis and the Administrator’s determination of risk remain unchanged following APHIS’ consideration of the comments, then APHIS will authorize the importation of fresh fruit of litchi, longan, and rambutan from the Philippines into the continental U.S.

The Agricultural Marketing Service is announcing a meeting of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) on May 22-25, 2012. Topics covered at the meeting will include proposals that address petitions pertaining to the National List of Allowed and Prohibited Substances (National List), proposals that address substances on the National List that are due to sunset in 2013, proposals that address issues on materials and excluded methods, and proposals to amend the NOSB Policies and Procedures Manual. The meeting will be open to the public. Written public comments are due by May 3. The meeting agenda, NOSB proposals, instructions for submitting and viewing public comments, and instructions for requesting a time slot for oral comments are available on the National Organic Program (NOP) website here.

The Agricultural Marketing Service is revising the voluntary U.S. Standards for Grades of Cultivated Ginseng, effective May 7, 2012. To ensure the integrity of the Standards, the revisions will be based on quality and percentage defects. The new grades will replace the current ones and promote the orderly and efficient marketing of ginseng. Other changes will include a revised General Section, new tolerances, reclassified sizes, removed table “values” and amended definitions.

The Agricultural Marketing Service issued a final rule amending the procedures for determining the official leaf grade for Upland and Pima cotton, effective April 6, 2012. The leaf grade is part of the official classification which denotes cotton fiber quality used in cotton marketing and manufacturing of cotton products. Previously, the leaf grade was determined by visual examination and comparison to the Universal Cotton Standards for Leaf Grade that serves as the official cotton standards by qualified cotton classers. Amended procedures replace the classer’s leaf determination with the instrument leaf measurement made by the High Volume Instrument (HVI) system, which has been used in official cotton classification for Upland Cotton since 1991.

The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service issued emails April 2, 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 Food and Agriculture Organization's Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues (JMPR) Secretariat has published a report on Pesticide Residues in Food, entitled the "Evaluations of 2011 JMPR PART I- RESIDUES." This report may be accessed on the FAO website here.

The Sweetener Users Association (SUA) urged the Agriculture Department to increase the tariff rate quota (TRQ) for sugar soon, noting that the first day the USDA can make such changes was April 1. The March 28, 2012, letter from SUA to Michael Scuse, acting under secretary for Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services at the USDA, said the U.S. market needs additional supplies of sugar and a TRQ increase is the only way to provide supplies at reasonable prices. The USDA must consider a disappointing season of Mexican production and imports as well as strong demand for sugar in the U.S., it said. While helpful and appropriate, a TRQ reallocation alone would be insufficient to deal with the supply problems and to mini maze shortfalls the USDA shouldn't lowball its TRQ increase, the SUA said. One market analyst said additional imports of 728,000-961,000 short tons, raw value, will be necessary, said the SUA.