Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service September 23, 2010 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

We are proposing a change related to our proposed rule published in the Federal Register on April 9, 2009, that would amend the regulations to provide for the importation of wooden handicrafts from China under certain conditions. One of those conditions would have required that, unless the handicrafts are under 6 inches in diameter and treated with methyl bromide, they must be treated with heat treatment or heat treatment with moisture reduction that raises the temperature at the center of the handicraft to at least 71.1 [deg]C and maintains the handicraft at that center temperature for at least 75 minutes. Based on a recently published article, in this supplemental proposed rule we are proposing measures that would modify this requirement to a temperature at the center of at least 60 [deg]C for a duration of at least 60 minutes.