Proposals to address competition in the livestock and poultry industry are on the way in 2022, according to the Department of Agriculture, one of many federal agencies whose actions in the coming year have the potential to affect farmers’ bottom line.
USDA is far from the only part of the federal government with authority in areas affecting the food and agriculture industries. Farmers and agribusiness in general should keep a close eye on what comes out of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Labor, the Department of the Interior, and the Food and Drug Administration.
For example, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued an emergency rule in November that requires companies with 100 or more employees to vaccinate their employees. But the litigation quickly followed, resulting in a stay of implementation of the rule by the federal court of appeals in New Orleans.
The nationwide litigation was consolidated in the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati, which lifted the stay on December 17. The Supreme Court will hear arguments on the matter on Friday, January 7.
OSHA said that despite the decision reinstating the requirement, it will not issue citations for noncompliance before January 10 “as long as an employer is making reasonable and good faith efforts to comply with the standard.”
The Agricultural Retailers Association opposed the mandate and expressed support for the Senate’s “symbolic” vote last month to overturn it, a move that received the votes of two Democrats, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Jon Tester of Montana. The Democratic-controlled House has not adopted the measure.
The best place to get an overview of what’s to come is in regulatory agendas issued by federal agencies. The latest one was released on December 13 and includes calendars of action which, if history is any guide, should probably be taken with a grain of salt.
Some of the ongoing regulatory efforts that the farming community should keep an eye on:
USDA
The Department of Agriculture projected in its spring regulatory agenda that proposals were on the way in November 2021 to better define “unfair, unfairly discriminatory, or deceptive” practices under the Packers and Corrals Act, as well as the scope of the P&S Law. Another proposal would address the use of poultry farmer classification systems.
The latest regulatory agenda, released last month, has January as the prospective time frame for those proposals, but a USDA spokesperson said the schedules on the agenda “should be seen as a snapshot of USDA thinking at the time we were in. developing the agenda. In other words, it is impossible to account for changes in priorities ”and the approval of new legislation or financing that could alter the schedule.
The P&S proposals will come this year, he said, but he was unable to offer anything more specific.
USDA also anticipates issuing a long-awaited proposal to revise organic standards for poultry and livestock and a rule to implement an expanded Pandemic Cover Crop Program (PCCP). The program pays for the cost of crop insurance for growers who plant cover crops.
The rule will also update the regulations for the Emergency Conservation Program; the Emergency Assistance Program for Farmed Livestock, Bees and Fish; and the Livestock Forage Disaster Program; Livestock compensation program; and payment eligibility provisions.
The USDA is also working on a voluntary program that allows the use of “Product of the USA” labels, so, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said at the White House on Monday, “to let consumers know exactly where their resources are being spent, the dollar they consume. “
A possible rule proposed later this year would attempt to make Child Nutrition Program meals and snacks consistent with the 2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans released in December.
The USDA also said its Food Safety and Inspection Service plans to finalize two rules: one that updates nutrition labeling for meat and poultry products and another that expands the categories of meat and poultry product labels “considered generically approved that can be used in the trade without prior FSIS review and approval, ”the USDA said in a“ regulatory priority statement ”issued with its agenda.
Environmental protection agency
How to define what Congress meant by “waters of the United States” in a way that can withstand legal scrutiny is a primary goal of the Environmental Protection Agency, but the agency is being cautious about when a new proposal will be published.
EPA, which is leading the new definition with input from the Army Corps of Engineers, is in the middle of a two-step process: It has already proposed what it calls a “fundamental rule” that will restore regulations to what they were before the The Obama administration’s Clean Water Rule of 2015.
EPA Administrator Michael Regan (Photo: Joy Philippi)
But the agency, administrator Michael Regan has said, is trying to craft a “durable” rule somewhere between the Obama rule and the Trump administration’s Navigable Water Protection Rule, which was struck down by a federal judge in August. .
The recently released regulatory agenda lists February as the target for a proposed new definition, but the agency said in a statement this week that “the EPA plans to issue a proposed rule later this year.” Meanwhile, the EPA said it plans to continue listening to “various stakeholders” as it moves through the process.
Regan has said long-standing farm exemptions will remain, but History has shown that it will be difficult, to say the least, to find a “middle ground” in what is known as WOTUS, for “US waters.”
In addition to the WOTUS regulations, EPA is working on a variety of regulations, many in the area of pesticides.
For example, EPA plans to issue a final rule this year that would allow an exemption from both the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) and the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act for certain protectants incorporated into plants, or PIPs, products created in plants through biotechnology, “as long as their pesticidal substances are found in plants that are sexually compatible with the recipient plant” and meet safety requirements.
The agency also continues to work to expand current pesticide crop grouping regulations, which allow EPA to establish pesticide tolerances for related crops based on data for a representative set of crops. “EPA hopes that these revisions will promote greater use of crop grouping for tolerance establishment purposes and to facilitate the availability of pesticides for minor crop uses,” the agency said on the regulatory agenda.
Another ongoing effort seeks to address pest resistance to Bt corn and cotton by planting non-Bt refuges and taking corrective action. The agency recently released its response to comments on a 2020 proposal and issued a revised proposal.
work Department
An important rule that is expected to be finalized this year has to do with how the Labor Department sets wages for farm workers. The department proposed a rule on December 1 that would reuse the Farm Labor Survey to calculate the Adverse Effect Wage Rates used in the H-2A program. The Trump administration had tried to eliminate the FLS, but a federal judge rejected that effort.
Farm and farm worker groups are required to submit comments by January 30. The regulatory agenda does not list a date for a final rule.
Another regulation with a potentially large impact on agriculture is a heat standard, but there is no indication when it could happen. OSHA is just beginning to review the comments submitted in an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking published in October. That ANPRM was seeking “information on issues that may be considered when developing a standard, including the scope of the standard and the types of controls that might be necessary.”
OSHA noted that 18 of the last 19 years were the hottest on record.
Next week: What to expect from the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of the Interior.
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