Department of Agriculture July 19, 2011 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This is a notice to inform the public of the topics on the agenda for an upcoming meeting of the Secretary's Advisory Committee on Animal Health. The meeting is organized by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service to discuss matters of animal health.

We are advising the public that an environmental assessment and finding of no significant impact have been prepared by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service relative to the control of hemlock woolly adelgid. Based on its finding of no significant impact, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has determined that an environmental impact statement need not be prepared.

We are proposing to amend the regulations governing the importation of animals and animal products by recognizing 25 Member States of the European Union as the APHIS-defined European Union poultry trade region and adding it to the list of regions we consider to be free of Newcastle disease. We are taking this action based on a risk evaluation that we prepared in which we determined that the proposed region meets our requirements for being considered free of Newcastle disease. We also determined that the region meets our requirements for being considered free of highly pathogenic avian influenza. In addition, we are proposing to establish requirements governing the importation of live birds and poultry, including hatching eggs, and poultry meat and products from the APHIS-defined European Union poultry trade region, and to update avian disease terms and definitions. These actions would facilitate the importation of live birds and poultry, and poultry meat and products, from the APHIS- defined European Union poultry trade region while protecting the United States from communicable avian diseases.

In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (Pub. L. 104-13) and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) regulations at 5 CFR part 1320, this notice announces the National Agricultural Library's intent to request renewal of an information collection relating to existing nutrition education materials (i.e. recipes and cookbooks) targeting low-income and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) eligible persons. These two voluntary forms give SNAP Education (SNAP-Ed) providers the opportunity to share resources that they have developed or used.

The Rural Business-Cooperative Service is amending its regulations for the Business and Industry Guaranteed Loan Program to ensure the Agency has sufficient right(s) for reimbursement when an Agency guaranteed portion of a loan is sold to a holder. This action is necessary because the rule is not sufficiently clear that the use of loan funds for purposes not approved by the Agency is a reason to find the guarantee unenforceable regardless of whether the guaranteed portion of the loan has been sold to a holder. This action ensures the Agency has sufficient rights for reimbursement when an Agency guaranteed portion of the loan is sold to a holder.

This document requests input to help us improve services and reduce duplication of effort, including collecting information from the public. Specifically, the Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services (FFAS) agencies including the Farm Service Agency (FSA) and the Risk Management Agency (RMA) have been working on a joint, coordinated initiative to have a common U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) framework for producer's to report information to participate in certain USDA programs. FSA and RMA have been working in coordination with the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) and the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) on the common reporting process. The USDA retrospective review request for information (RFI) published in the Federal Register on April 20, 2011, included the initiative to simplify and reduce the reporting burden on the public for submitting participation information for USDA programs, while simultaneously reducing our administrative and operating costs by sharing similar data across participating agencies. We believe the public, especially farmers, producers, ranchers, and the crop insurance industry who submit and use the information may have suggestions that may effectively reduce the burden of providing the information that USDA agencies require. Any resulting improvements to the processes will be within existing legislative authorities.