“This site will be updated regularly to ensure updated information on the Wholesale Pork Reporting Negotiated Rulemaking Committee is available at all times – to both Committee members and the public,“ said AMS Administrator Rayne Pegg. “The committee will bring greater transparency and confidence to our program, and will benefit pork producers, packers, processors, retailers, and consumers.“

The site can be found here. Currently, the site has easy-to-navigate sections for Meetings, Notices, News Releases, and Resources. These sections contain all the Federal Register notices and news releases published to date, as well as valuable background information about the Mandatory Price Reporting Act of 2010 and the Negotiated Rulemaking Act. The Meetings section will include agendas prior to each meeting, and minutes post-meeting. AMS encourages interested persons to check this site regularly for updates and information.

The President signed into law the Mandatory Price Reporting Act of 2010 (Act) on 27 September 2010. Among other provisions, the Act amends the Agricultural Marketing Act of 1946 to extend livestock mandatory reporting by five years and to require mandatory reporting of wholesale pork cuts. To implement this new provision, the Act directed USDA to establish a committee to engage in negotiated rulemaking.

Negotiated rulemaking was a concept originally endorsed in 1990, whereby federal agencies were directed to consider an alternative approach to rulemaking. It is also known as “regulatory negotiation“, or “reg-neg“, and has been used successfully by agencies to bring interested parties into the rule-drafting process at an early stage. After the development of a proposal by the Committee, the public will be afforded an opportunity for comment under normal notice-and-comment rulemaking procedures.