APHIS Provides Update on Overhaul of U.S.-Canada Greenhouse Certification Program
A working group is meeting regularly to develop the new U.S.-Canada Greenhouse Certification Program(GCP), said the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service in an update on the ongoing overhaul of the program. The GCP memorandum of understanding has been extended to permit the existing program to continue until the reform is completed. The U.S. Department of Agriculture and Canadian Food Inspection Agency are on track, said APHIS.
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The GCP program, begun in the mid-1990s, allows approved facilities in the U.S. and Canada to ship eligible plants under an export certification label in lieu of a traditional phytosanitary certificate. Under the GCP, participants enter into a written agreement with the National Plant Protection Organization of the exporting country. The NPPO then verifies that export conditions are routinely met through an audit and inspection process, rather than requiring an export inspection and phytosanitary certificate for each export shipment. GCP participants must implement measures to ensure that eligible plants are grown, stored, packed, and shipped free from regulated pests and otherwise meet the requirements of the importing country, APHIS said.
As part of theCanada-United States Regulatory Cooperation Council initiative, announced by President Obama and Prime Minister Harper in February 2011, an APHIS-CFIA working group has been formed and is revising the 16-year old GCP to modernize the program and reflect industry practices, pests of concern, and new regulations.
The revised program will move to an authorized plant list in place of the current list of prohibited plants. A draft plant list was developed by APHIS and CFIA, and was revised after consultations with Canadian and U.S. stakeholders in 2010. The revised GCP will include a process to add or delete plants from the authorized list, and APHIS anticipates that the transition period will be used by stakeholders to request the addition of any plants that were not identified during the 2010 consultation, it said.
Email documents@brokerpower.com for a copy of the APHIS update.