Department of Commerce December 24, 2009 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

On November 4, 2009, NMFS published a proposed rule to increase the Atlantic bluefin tuna (BFT) General category maximum daily retention limit; allow the General category season to remain open until the January subquota is reached; and increase the Harpoon category daily incidental retention limit. The proposed rule is intended to more thoroughly utilize available U.S. BFT quota, particularly for the General and Harpoon (commercial handgear) categories. In the proposed rule, NMFS announced the end of the comment period as December 21, 2009, which would allow an approximately 45-day comment period. In order to provide additional opportunities for the public and other interested parties to comment on the proposed rule, NMFS is extending the comment period for this action until March 31, 2010. Comments received by NMFS on the proposed rule will help NMFS determine whether and how to implement final management measures for the BFT General and Harpoon categories as described in the proposed action.

This rule updates the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) legal authority citations for the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) to replace citations to the President's Notice of November 10, 2008 Continuation of Emergency Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction with the President's Notice of November 6, 2009 on the same subject and to reflect the recodification of former 42 U.S.C app. 466c as 15 U.S.C 1824a. BIS is making these changes to keep the CFR legal authority citations for the EAR current.