Biotech Updates

USDA APHIS Opens Public Comment Period for GE Wheat Field Trials

September 30, 2015

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has made available for a 30-day public comment period its proposed plan to strengthen oversight of genetically engineered (GE) wheat field trials. The proposed plan calls for all future field trials of GE wheat to be done under APHIS permit, to include requirements for more stringent post-harvest monitoring of volunteer wheat plants.

APHIS will consider all comments received on or before October 26, 2015. Notice of this comment period closing date is published in the September 25, 2015 issue of the Federal Register.

Comments are accepted at the Regulations.gov website, where relevant documents are also available.