Agricultural Marketing Service August 2017 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This rule revises the U.S. Standards for Grades of Shelled Walnuts and the U.S. Standards for Grades of Walnuts in the Shell issued under the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1946. The Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) of the Department of Agriculture (USDA) is amending the color requirements to include red-colored walnuts. In addition, AMS is removing the ``Unclassified'' section. These revisions will modernize the standards to more accurately represent today's marketing practices and to meet growing consumer demand by providing greater marketing flexibility.

The Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) is making corrections to the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) by revising the authority citation for its regulation, Cotton Research and Promotion. In a final rule published in the Federal Register on June 24, 2015, changes were inadvertently made to remove a legal citation from the authority citation and to erroneously include an unnecessary authority citation after a section in AMS regulations. This document corrects those errors.

Notice is hereby given that a referendum to amend Marketing Order and Agreement No. 929 (order), which regulates the handling of cranberries grown in the states of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon, Washington, and Long Island in the State of New York, did not meet the minimum voting requirements for approval. The Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937, as amended, hereinafter referred to as the ``Act'' requires, in part, that a proposed amendment to the cranberries order must be approved by two-thirds of producers voting, or by those voting in the referendum representing at least two-thirds of the volume of cranberries, as well as by processors who have frozen or canned more than 50 percent of the volume of cranberries within the production area. Processors representing only 18 percent of the volume of cranberries within the production area voted in the referendum. Because a minimum of 50 percent of the volume of cranberries processed within the production area is required in order to pass, the referendum did not pass and the proposed amendment will not be implemented. The amendment, which was proposed by the Cranberry Marketing Committee (Committee), would have authorized the Committee to receive and expend voluntary contributions from domestic sources.