Paper and Paper-Based Packaging Promotion, Research and Information Order; Clarifying Changes

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE <SUBAGY>Agricultural Marketing Service</SUBAGY> <CFR>7 CFR Part 1222</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Doc. No. AMS-SC-23-0080]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Paper and Paper-Based Packaging Promotion, Research and Information Order; Clarifying Changes</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Agricultural Marketing Service, USDA. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Proposed rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) proposes multiple clarifying amendments to the Paper and Paper-Based Packaging Promotion, Research and Information Order (Order). The amendments include revising the definition of importer; adding a definition for partnership; clarifying the nominations process; clarifying language about in person and electronic voting for any Board meetings; updating the timing of financial reporting; and revising requirements for when exemptions can be requested. These actions would modify language in the Order to bring it up to date with current industry practices. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Comments must be received by August 14, 2024. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> Interested persons are invited to submit written comments concerning this proposed rule. Comments may be mailed to the Docket Clerk, Market Development Division, Specialty Crops Program, AMS, USDA, 1400 Independence Avenue SW, STOP 0237, Washington, DC 20250-0237; Fax: (202) 720-8938; or submitted electronically by Email: <E T="03">SM.USDA.MRP.AMS.MDDComment@usda.gov;</E> or via Federal e-rulemaking portal at <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov.</E> Comments should reference the document number and the date and page number of this issue of the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> . All comments submitted in response to this proposed rule will be included in the rulemaking record and will be made available to the public. Please be advised that the identity of the individuals or entities submitting the comments will be made public on the internet at the address provided above. A plain language summary of this proposed rule is available at <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> in the docket for this rulemaking. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Samantha Mareno, Agricultural Marketing Specialist, Market Development Division, Specialty Crops Program, Agricultural Marketing Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1400 Independence Avenue SW, Room 1406-S, STOP 0244, Washington, DC 20250-0244; Telephone: (720) 827-4907; or Email: <E T="03">Samantha.Mareno@usda.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> This proposed rule affecting the Order (7 CFR part 1222) is authorized by the Commodity Promotion, Research, and Information Act of 1996 (Act) (7 U.S.C. 7411-7425). <HD SOURCE="HD1">Executive Orders 12866, 13563 and 14094</HD> AMS is issuing this proposed rule in conformance with Executive Orders 12866, 13563, and 14094. Executive Orders 12866 and 13563 direct agencies to assess all costs and benefits of available regulatory alternatives and, if regulation is necessary, to select regulatory approaches that maximize net benefits (including potential economic, environmental, public health and safety effects, distributive impacts, and equity). Executive Order 13563 emphasizes the importance of quantifying both costs and benefits, reducing costs, harmonizing rules, and promoting flexibility. Executive Order 14094 reaffirms, supplements, and updates Executive Order 12866 and further directs agencies to solicit and consider input from a wide range of affected and interested parties through a variety of means. This proposed rule is not a significant regulatory action within the meaning of Executive Order 12866. Accordingly, this action has not been reviewed by the Office of Management and Budget under section 6 of the Executive Order. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Executive Order 13175</HD> This action has been reviewed in accordance with the requirements of Executive Order 13175, Consultation and Coordination with Indian Tribal Governments. AMS has assessed the impact of this proposed rule on Indian Tribes and determined that this proposed rule would not have Tribal implications that require consultation under Executive Order 13175. AMS hosts a quarterly teleconference with Tribal leaders where matters of mutual interest regarding the marketing of agricultural products are discussed. Information about the proposed changes to the regulations will be shared during an upcoming quarterly call, and Tribal leaders will be informed about the proposed revisions to the regulation and the opportunity to submit comments. AMS will work with the USDA Office of Tribal Relations to ensure meaningful consultation is provided as needed with regard to these proposed changes to the Order. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Executive Order 12988</HD> This proposal has been reviewed under Executive Order 12988, Civil Justice Reform. It is not intended to have retroactive effect. Section 524 of the Act (7 U.S.C. 7423) provides that it shall not affect or preempt any other Federal or State law authorizing promotion or research relating to an agricultural commodity. Under Section 519 of the Act (7 U.S.C. 7418), a person subject to an order may file a written petition with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), stating that an order, any provision of an order, or any obligation imposed in connection with an order, is not established in accordance with the law, and request a modification of an order or an exemption from an order. Any petition filed challenging an order, any provision of an order, or any obligation imposed in connection with an order, shall be filed within two years after the effective date of an order, provision, or obligation subject to challenge in the petition. The petitioner will have the opportunity for a hearing on the petition. Thereafter, USDA will issue a ruling on the petition. The Act provides that the district court of the United States for any district in which the petitioner resides or conducts business shall have the jurisdiction to review a final ruling on the petition if the petitioner files a complaint for that purpose not later than 20 days after the date of the entry of USDA's final ruling. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Background</HD> Under the Order, which became effective on January 23, 2014, the Paper and Packaging Board (Board), with oversight by USDA, administers a nationally coordinated program of research, promotion and information designed to strengthen the paper and paper-based packaging industry. The program covers four types of paper and paper-based packaging—printing and writing paper (used to make products for printing, writing and other communication purposes), kraft packaging paper (used for products like grocery bags and sacks), containerboard (used to make corrugated boxes, shipping containers and related products), and paperboard (used for food and beverage packaging, tubes, and other miscellaneous products). The program is financed by assessments on domestic manufacturers and importers of paper and paper-based packaging. This proposed rulemaking would make multiple clarifying amendments to the Order. These amendments include revising the definition of importer; adding a definition for partnership; clarifying the nomination process; clarifying language about in person and electronic voting for any Board meetings; updating the timing of financial reporting; and revising requirements concerning when exemptions may be requested. The Board, which is composed of domestic manufacturers from across the country and importers, unanimously recommended the proposed changes to the Order on August 19, 2023. This action would modify language in the Order to bring it up to date with current industry practices. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Board Recommendation To Revise Order</HD> In subpart A of the Order, several sections would be revised to clarify terms for the Board and the paper and paper-based packaging industry. Section 1222.7 currently defines fiscal period and marketing year. Proposed section 1222.7 would revise fiscal period to fiscal year as the term is better understood by the industry. The definition of importer in § 1222.8 would be revised to further clarify that importers are persons who import paper and paper-based packaging from outside the United States, that is subsequently released from custody by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (Customs) and introduced into the stream of commerce into the United States. Specifically, those persons are included who hold title of the foreign manufactured paper and paper-based packaging. The proposed revision is similar to the current definition of eligible importer in § 1222.101 (f) of Subpart B—Referendum Procedures. Sections 1222.12 and 1222.13 currently include the term produce and producer respectively in the definition of manufacture and manufacturer. The term produce and producer are not used in the paper and paper-based packaging industry. Therefore, this proposed rule would remove these terms from the definition of manufacture and manufacturer. Lastly, a new term for partnership would be added at § 1222.19 to state that a partnership includes, but is not limited to, spouses and joint ventures. This change is intended to clarify who is responsible for paying assessments. With this change, the existing sections 1222.19 through 1222.29 would be renumbered. Section 1222.41 currently outlines the Board nominations and appointments process. Section 1222.41(c)(1) would be updated to clarify the process for conducting outreach and specifically issue a call for nominations to all current manufacturers and importers who have paid assessments during the prior fiscal year. Furthermore, section 1222.41(c)(4) and (c)(5) would be amended to remove repetitive language. Lastly, section 1222.41(c)(10) would be changed to specify that no ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 34k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━