The National Oceanographic & Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has been utilizing its Seafood Import Monitoring Program (SIMP) to require importers of certain seafood species to file chain of custody data at the time of filing entry into the United States to combat illegal, unregulated and unauthorized fishing and harvesting. Of course, every data submission at time of entry requires documentation to support the electronic submission, and that applies to SIMP. Since January 2018, NMFS has adopted a regulatory posture of “informed compliance” for shipments subject to SIMP. Under that posture, Customs has been permitting entry and releasing certain seafood with missing SIMP data, provided the data is supplemented in a timely manner. NMFS’ reasoning is that SIMP should not disrupt the flow of trade and endanger the importation of legally harvested seafood shipments, while ensuring the trade community is ready for the program to become fully operational.
NMFS’ SIMP “informed compliance” period ends on April 7, 2018. After the expiration of the referenced period, importers of SIMP-regulated shipments must provide all the required SIMP entry data to avoid a Customs rejection of the entry. Customs’ rejection will result in the need to refile the electronic entry through the Customs ACE Portal with the appropriate SIMP data.
According to NOAA, during the informed compliance period, 90% of the entries subject to SIMP have included full data sets. NOAA interprets this data point to mean the trade community is ready for a full compliance. However, NOAA’s referenced interpretation depends upon whether NOAA has clear visibility into those entries for which SIMP data is required and whether the importer has the necessary records to support the electronic entry data elements filed with the entry. These facts remain to be seen and will be discovered when NOAA begins to take an enforcement posture.
Shrimp
Shrimp and abalone species have not been required to comply with SIMP, thus far. However, there is discussion to push shrimp importers to comply with the program to supply the chain of custody data. Originally, NOAA sets shrimp’s compliance to a later date due to concerns that the domestic shrimping industry would be unable to meet the same chain-of-custody requirements that would be applied to imported shrimp shipments if they were included from the program’s inception. If shrimp species are added to SIMP, both wild-caught and aquaculture shrimp would be covered by the program.
Commerce Trusted Trader Program
As a complement to the SIMP program, NMFS has also proposed a rule to establish a voluntary Commerce Trusted Trader Program (CTTP). Under CTTP, importers can seek reduced reporting and recordkeeping requirements and streamlined entry into the U.S. for seafood imports subject to the SIMP. The comment period for this proposed rulemaking ends March 19, 2018.
Clearly, importers of seafood subject to SIMP must begin obtaining chain of custody documents to be prepared for the upcoming April 7, 2018 full compliance date. NMFS has already begun auditing chain of custody documents to verify compliance of the data elements submitted electronically during the entry submission process.
The seafood species currently subject to the SIMP chain-of-custody declaration and recordkeeping requirements are:
- Atlantic Cod
- Pacific Cod
- Blue Crab (Atlantic)
- Red King Crab
- Dolphinfish (Mahi Mahi)
- Grouper
- Red Snapper
- Sea Cucumber
- Sharks
- Swordfish and Tunas (Albacore, Bigeye, Skipjack, Yellowfin, and Bluefin)
FDAImports.com’s regulatory specialists and affiliated attorneys routinely assist seafood manufacturers and importers with HACCP planning, import alert violations, detentions, and facility inspections.
This is the first blog in a two part series. For Current Updates and more information please see “Shrimp Added to NOAA/NMFS’s Seafood Traceability Program.”
Importers attending the Seafood Expo North America in Boston, March 11-13, 2018, are welcome to meet with our team there. Click here to learn about our panel discussion, “FDA and Customs Enforcement Actions: What to Expect in 2018.”
