Ag Policy Blog

The Trump administration on Thursday updated its agenda of regulatory and deregulatory actions, taking credit for reducing regulations and providing signals of what actions may be taken in the next few months.

Government-wide, the White House said, “the agenda represents ongoing progress toward the goals of more effective and less burdensome regulation and includes the following developments:

-“Agencies withdrew 469 actions proposed in the Fall 2016 agenda;

-“Agencies reconsidered 391 active actions by reclassifying them as long-term (282) and inactive (109), allowing for further careful review;

-“Economically significant regulations fell to 58, or about 50 percent less than Fall 2016;

- “For the first time, agencies will post and make public their list of ‘inactive’ rules — providing notice to the public of regulations still being reviewed or considered.”

The Organic Trade Association said it was disappointed that the administration appears to have dropped rules on the origin of livestock requirements for dairy animals and dropped proposed organic standards on aquaculture, bee keeping and pet food.

“The Organic Trade Association is disappointed that the voluntary industry-driven standards that the organic sector has prioritized and progressed over many years — through a transparent and inclusive process — have now been distorted as regulatory burdens by their omission from the administration’s Unified Agenda,” the group said.

“The organic sector has weighed in on these priority areas to evolve the organic standards and supports them moving forward,” OTA said.

“The proposed origin of livestock requirements for dairy animals under the USDA organic regulations is particularly important to the organic industry and has been needed for some time. It eliminates much of the uneven playing field that organic dairy producers currently face.“

“All of these rules now on the cutting room floor are critical in maintaining the integrity of the USDA organic seal and reflecting the consumer expectations of that seal,” OTA said.

Following are links to the overall Unified Agenda, the Agriculture Department section, and the Environmental Protection Agency agenda item on rewriting the Clean Water Rule, also known as the Waters of the United States rule.

Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs https://www.reginfo.gov/…

Agency Rule List, USDA: http://dld.bz/…

EPA definition of Waters of the U.S.: http://dld.bz/…

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