AMEND THE FEDERAL SEED ACT WEDNESDAY, JULY 23, 1969 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON DEPARTMENTAL OPERATIONS OF THE The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room 1301 Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Eligio de la Garza presiding. Present: Representatives de la Garza, Abernethy, Kleppe, Mathias, and Sebelius. Also present: Mrs. Christine S. Gallagher, clerk, and William C. Black, general counsel. Mr. DE LA GARZA. The Subcommittee on Departmental Operations will now come to order for the purpose of considering H.R. 10236 by Mr. Abernethy; H.R. 10423 by Mr. Montgomery; H.R. 10552 by Mr. Jones, Mr. Felton, and Mr. Myers; and H.R. 10653 by Mr. Springer. (H.R. 10236 follows:) [H.R. 10236, 91st Cong., first sess.] A BILL To amend the Federal Seed Act Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1. Section 101 (a) (25) of the Federal Seed Act (7 U.S.C. 1561 (a) (25)), is amended to read as follows: (25) The term 'seed certifying agency' means (A) an agency authorized under the laws of a State, territory, or possession, to officially certify seed and which has standards and procedures approved by the Secretary to assure the genetic purity and identity of the seed certified, or (B) an agency of a foreign country determined by the Secretary of Agriculture to adhere to procedures and standards for seed certification comparable to those adhered to generally by seed certifying agencies under (A).” SEC. 2. Section 102 of the Federal Seed Act (7 U.S.C. 1562) is amended to read as follows: "SEC. 102. Any labeling, advertisement, or other representation subject to this Act which represents that any seed is a class of certified seed shall be deemed to be false in this respect unless (a) it has been determined by a seed certifying agency that such seed conformed to standards of genetic purity and identity as to kind or variety, and is in compliance with the rules and regulations of such agency pertaining to such seed; and (b) the seed bears an official label issued for such seed by a seed certifying agency stating that the seed is a class of certified seed." Mr. DE LA GARZA. The main bill was introduced by Mr. Abernethy, but in deference to Mr. Montgomery, who must proceed to another meeting, we will hear you now, Mr. Montgomery, on your bill. (1) STATEMENT OF HON. G. V. MONTGOMERY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI Mr. MONTGOMERY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you giving me this opportunity to appear before you today and I can assure you I will be very brief in expressing my support for H.R. 10236. As you know, Mr. Chairman, I have introduced a similar bill, and I introduced this bill on April 22 of this year. The bill that we are talking about today would amend the Federal Seed Act to allow the Secretary of Agriculture to set minimum standards for the certification of seeds moving in interstate and international commerce in order for the consumer and producer to be assured the genetic purity of the seeds. I feel that this bill would be of great benefit to both the producer and consumer of seeds. In all instances, persons would know that the seeds they are purchasing adhere to basic minimum standards of certification as set by the Secretary of Agriculture. At the same time this piece of legislation would allow States or certifying organizations that wish to do so, to set their standards even higher. I would point out that it is the intent of this legislation that the Secretary of Agriculture set the standards according to those presently ascribed to by the Association of Official Seeds Certifying Agencies. This legislation most definitely has my support and the support of the Mississippi Seed Improvement Association from my home State. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I request your thoughtful consideration of H.R. 10236 and urge a favorable vote by this subcommittee. Mr. DE LA GARZA. Thank you very much, Mr. Montgomery. In the absence of other authors of the legislation, we will now call the spokesman from the Department, Mr. Stanley F. Rollin, Chief of the Seed Branch, Grain Division, C. & M.S., USDA. We will be very glad to hear from you, Mr. Rollin. STATEMENT OF STANLEY F. ROLLIN, CHIEF, SEED BRANCH, GRAIN DIVISION, C. AND M.S., U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE Mr. ROLLIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. I appreciate the opportunity to present to you the Department's views concerning H.R. 10236. This bill would amend the Federal Seed Act to require approval by the Secretary of Agriculture of the standards and procedures of official seed certifying agencies governing the genetic purity and identity of the seed these agencies certify. At the present time the Federal Seed Act automatically recognizes the rules and regulations of individual official seed certifying agencies. The Department supports this bill, with minor changes in language which have been outlined in a report which has been forwarded to the committee. The Federal Seed Act (secs. 101 (a) (25) and 102) presently provides that an officially authorized seed certifying agency need only determine that seed has met the agency's own rules and regulations on genetic purity to be "certified seed" in compliance with the act. There is no standard to govern what these rules and regulations shall be. Most officially recognized seed certifying agencies in the United States are members of the Association of Official Seed Certifying Agencies. Most official agencies have rules and regulations which comply with the association's recommendations. However, some agencies that are members and some that are not members have rules that do no comply. The association has no legal authority to require compliance with its recommendations. The result is that the term "certified seed" may have a different meaning when seed is certified in one State than when certified in another. This may vary from year to year. This can be misleading to the buyer. It encourages unfair competition in the marketplace. In speaking of certified seed we are referring only to the "genetic purity and identity" and not standards for germination, weed seed, or purse seed percentage of the kind determined solely in a laboratory. In referring to "genetic purity and identity" we are speaking of preserving the record of the "bloodlines" and the procedures that are necessary to insure that these "bloodlines" are not contaminated in the field and in harvesting, processing, and packaging. The buyer then has official assurance of a pure variety of seed similar to papers on a registered purebred animal. For example, if scientific evidence and practical experience show that under most conditions a variety of a certain kind of seed will not maintain its genetic purity and identity if reproduced from seed more than three generations, that variety should not be permitted to be reproduced more than three generations and still be certified as genetically pure. The Department does not plan to enforce stricter standards than are presently recommended by the Association of Official Seed Certifying Agencies. We are primarily interested in seeing that all official certifying agencies meet at least the minimum standards recommended by this association so that the term "certified seed" will convey the same meaning to all buyers of seed in the United States. The United States also would be in a stronger position in promoting the sale and acceptance of U.S. certified seed in foreign countries if this degree of uniformity were accomplished by passage of this bill. We could then assure foreign buyers that all seed certified in the United States met certain specified minimum standards of genetic purity and identity. Mr. Chairman, this completes my prepared statement. If you have questions, I shall be glad to respond to them. Mr. DE LA GARZA. Thank you very much, Mr. Rollin. Are there any questions? Mr. MATHIAS, NO. Mr. DE LA GARZA. Mr. Rollin, would this entail a need for more funds to carry out your inspection or surveillance of this act? Mr. ROLLIN. No, we do not visualize any additional funds will be needed for this activity, because we have a working agreement with each of the State departments of agriculture in all 50 States which cooperate with us in enforcement of the Federal Seed Act. They do the principal part of the work and merely report the violations to our Department. As far as the certifying agencies are concerned, I think that once they are required to have certain minimum rules, that this will be selfenforcing and will be followed by these agencies. Mr. DE LA GARZA. Well, would you think that the States that cooperated with you-it would require additional funds from them or additional manpower? Mr. ROLLIN. Not as I see it. They have inspectors who go around the State, sample seeds and inspect labels to see that they are in compliance. As I visualize this, if there is any State certifying agency which does not meet the standards, the Secretary would then not approve its standards. He would notify all of the States that a certain kind of seed coming from a certain State would not be considered certified. Under those circumstances, if another State found such seed moving into that State for sale they would automatically stop sale of the seed and require the certified labels to be taken off the bags. This would be the extent of the enforcement as I see it. Mr. DE LA GARZA. This is a little bit aside, but do we have any cooperative agreements in any foreign countries as far as the certification or similarity of certifying criteria? Mr. ROLLIN. We are a member of the OECD, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. This organization has what is called a scheme for the international certification of seed or some similar title. We are members of that scheme, and we have cooperation to the extent that we have a delegate that helps to set up the international standards for this particular international scheme. Mr. DE LA GARZA. Thank you very much, Mr. Rollin. Mr. MATHIAS. Mr. Chairman, what prompted this legislation? Mr. ROLLIN. I believe it was prompted by the Association of Official Seed Certifying Agencies finding that some of their members or some of the States who are not members of the association, have a different standard than the minimum set by the association. This led to unfair competition between the seed being marketed from certain States. They desired to try to promote more uniformity in the term "certified seed" in the different States. I think that the witness for this association can probably answer this more readily than I can. This is not a Department bill. Mr. MATHIAS. Fine. Thank you very much. Mr. DE LA GARZA. Thank you very much for coming up this morning, Mr. Rollin. We appreciate it. We will now hear from Dr. Walter O. Scott, president, Association of Official Seed Certifying Agencies, Urbana, Ill. We will be very happy to hear from you, Dr. Scott. STATEMENT OF DR. WALTER 0. SCOTT, PRESIDENT, ASSOCIATION OF OFFICIAL SEED CERTIFLING AGENCIES, URBANA, ILL. Dr. SCOTT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I am Walter O. Scott of Urbana, Ill., president of the Association of Official Seed Certifying Agencies. I appreciate very much the opportunity to appear before you in support of this legislation. |