Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service March 9, 2010 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

We are adopting as a final rule, with changes, an interim rule that amended the foreign quarantine and user fee regulations by removing the exemptions from inspection for imported fruits and vegetables grown in Canada and the exemptions from user fees for commercial vessels, commercial trucks, commercial railroad cars, commercial aircraft, and international air passengers entering the United States from Canada. The interim rule was necessary in part because we were not recovering the costs of the inspection activities we were engaged in at the U.S./Canada border. In addition, our data showed an increasing number of interceptions on the U.S./Canada border of prohibited material that originated in Canada and countries other than Canada that presents a high risk of introducing plant pests or animal diseases into the United States. These findings, combined with additional Canadian airport preclearance data on interceptions of ineligible agricultural products approaching the U.S. border from Canada, strongly indicated that we needed to expand and strengthen our pest exclusion and smuggling interdiction efforts at that border. As a result of the interim rule, all agricultural products imported from Canada are subject to inspection, and all commercial conveyances, with certain exceptions established by this final rule, as well as airline passengers arriving on flights from Canada, are subject to user fees.