NMFS to End Informed Compliance Period for High-Risk Seafood ACE Filing Requirements
The National Marine Fisheries Service has announced that it will end its “informed compliance” period and require full filing of Seafood Import Monitoring Program data in ACE beginning April 7, CBP said in a CSMS message. “Beginning April 7, filings for products flagged for NMFS SIM (NM8) data, with no SIMP data, that are incomplete, or that contain erroneous SIM PGA data, must be corrected before they will be accepted,” CBP said.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Communications Daily is required reading for senior executives at top telecom corporations, law firms, lobbying organizations, associations and government agencies (including the FCC). Join them today!
Since the requirements took effect Jan. 1, NMFS had been giving filers of entries of high-risk seafood a grace period, during which entries rejected because of missing or incorrect SIMP data that could not be quickly resolved could be refiled under the same entry without the SIMP message set (see 1712190028). The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration “has observed an encouraging and steadily increasing rate of compliance with SIMP filings,” CBP said. “Therefore, NMFS is providing notice that SIMP informed compliance provisions will cease on April 7, 2018.”
SIMP filing and record-keeping requirements apply to several species identified by NMFS in its December 2016 final rule as high-risk: Atlantic cod, Pacific cod, blue crab, red king crab, dolphinfish (Mahi Mahi), grouper, red snapper, sea cucumber, sharks, swordfish, and albacore, bigeye, Bluefin, skipjack and yellowfin tuna (see 1612080014). Required data elements include information on the harvester or producer, the species of fish, and where the fish was harvested and landed. NMFS recently proposed a “Commerce Trusted Trader” program that would waive some filing requirements for qualifying importers (see 1801160041).
Record-keeping requirements under SIMP, as well as the requirements of other NMFS seafood trade monitoring programs, remain in effect despite the ongoing informed compliance period, the CSMS message said. “Filers are also reminded that the SIMP program includes a records retention provision, and all entries subject to SIMP may be audited and became subject to enforcement action beginning January 1, 2018,” it said. “Those engaged in the import, export or re-export of covered species must also comply with all other requirements of NOAA trade monitoring programs including the TTVP/NOAA 370 [Tuna Tracking and Verification Program/NOAA Form 370], HMS ITP [Highly Migratory Species International Trade Permit], and AMLR [Antarctic Marine Living Resources] trade programs, as applicable.”