September 27, 2012 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is amending the meat and poultry product regulations pertaining to the schedule of operations. FSIS is amending these regulations to define the 8-hour workday as including time that inspection program personnel need to prepare the inspection station, if necessary, or retrieve and return lot tally sheets; the time necessary for FSIS inspection program personnel to sharpen knives, if necessary; and the time necessary to conduct duties scheduled by FSIS, including administrative activities. The activities are integral and indispensable to inspectors' work and are part of the continuous workday as defined by the Fair Labor Standards Act. Therefore, they are activities that need to be part of the Agency's regulatory definition for the 8-hour workday.

This initial determination proposes to revise the list required by Executive Order No. 13126 (``Prohibition of Acquisition of Products Produced by Forced or Indentured Child Labor'') in accordance with the Department of Labor's ``Procedural Guidelines for the Maintenance of the List of Products Requiring Federal Contractor Certification as to Forced or Indentured Child Labor.'' Under the procurement regulations implementing this Executive Order, federal contractors who supply products on the list published by the Department of Labor must certify that they have made a good faith effort to determine whether forced or indentured child labor was used to produce the products listed. This notice proposes to add 6 new line items to the list (dried fish from Bangladesh, gold from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Wolframite from the Democratic Republic of Congo, cattle from South Sudan, garments from Vietnam and fish from Ghana) that the Department of Labor preliminarily believes might have been mined, produced or manufactured by forced or indentured child labor. The Department of Labor invites public comment on this initial determination. The Department will consider all public comments prior to publishing a final determination revising the list of products, made in consultation and cooperation with the Department of State and the Department of Homeland Security.

EPA is finalizing a limited approval and limited disapproval of revisions to the applicable state implementation plan for the State of Nevada. The revisions include new or amended State rules governing applications for, and issuance of, permits for stationary sources, but not including review and permitting of major sources and major modifications under parts C and D of title I of the Clean Air Act. EPA is taking this action under the Clean Air Act obligation to take action on State submittals of revisions to state implementation plans. The intended effect of the limited approval and limited disapproval action is to update the applicable state implementation plan with current State rules with respect to permitting, and to set the stage for remedying deficiencies in the permitting rules with respect to certain new or revised national ambient air quality standards. This limited disapproval action would not trigger sanctions under section 179 of the Clean Air Act but does trigger an obligation on EPA to promulgate a Federal Implementation Plan unless the State of Nevada corrects the deficiencies, and EPA approves the related plan revisions, within two years of the final action.