Notice2024-02508
Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Alaska Crab Arbitration
Primary source
Metadata and text below are from the Federal Register, a public-domain U.S. government work. Always verify the official published version before relying on it for any legal matter.
Published
February 7, 2024
Issuing agencies
Commerce DepartmentNational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 89 Issue 26 (Wednesday, February 7, 2024)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 26 (Wednesday, February 7, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 8412-8413]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2024-02508]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment
Request; Alaska Crab Arbitration
The Department of Commerce will submit the following information
collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for
review and clearance in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of
1995, on or after the date of publication of this notice. We invite the
general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed, and
continuing information collections, which helps us assess the impact of
our information collection requirements and minimize the public's
reporting burden. Public comments were previously requested via the
Federal Register on September 19, 2023, during a 60-day comment period.
This notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments.
Agency: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),
Commerce.
Title: Alaska Crab Arbitration.
OMB Control Number: 0648-0516.
Form Number(s): None.
Type of Request: Regular submission (extension of a current
information collection).
Number of Respondents: 2.
Average Hours per Response: Annual Arbitration Organization Report:
6 hours; Cost Allocation Agreement: 16 hours.
Total Annual Burden Hours: 28 hours.
Needs and Uses: The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS),
Alaska Regional Office, is requesting extension of a currently approved
information collection for the Arbitration System for the Crab
Rationalization Program.
The Crab Rationalization Program allocates Bering Sea and Aleutian
Islands (BSAI) crab resources among harvesters, processors, and coastal
communities. Under the Crab Rationalization Program, eligible License
Limitation Program license holders were issued crab quota shares (QS),
which are long term shares, based on their qualifying license
histories. The QS yield annual individual fishing quota (IFQ) that is
an exclusive harvest privilege for a portion of the total allowable
catch. Processor quota shares (PQS) are long term shares issued to
processors. The PQS yield annual individual processor quota (IPQ) that
is an exclusive privilege to receive, for processing, a portion of the
crab harvested with Class A IFQ.
This information collection for the Arbitration System is necessary
for NMFS to manage the Crab Rationalization Program crab fisheries in
the BSAI. This information collection is implemented under the Crab
Rationalization Program and required by regulations at 50 CFR 680.20.
NMFS requires that harvesters and processors abide by an Arbitration
System established to stabilize prices and negotiations during the crab
harvest season. The Arbitration System is necessary to reduce
contention in price negotiations. The information collected is
necessary for NMFS to verify the membership of the arbitration
organizations and maintain the Arbitration System.
The Arbitration System was designed to fairly and equitably resolve
price, delivery terms, performance standards, and other disputes in the
event that IFQ and IPQ holders are unable to reach agreement on
arbitration proceedings. The Arbitration System is also designed to
minimize the potential for antitrust violations. The Arbitration System
includes a provision for open negotiations among IPQ and IFQ holders,
as well as various negotiation approaches, including a share matching
approach, a lengthy season approach where parties may postpone binding
arbitration until during the season, and a binding arbitration
procedure to resolve price disputes between an IPQ holder and eligible
IFQ holders. The Arbitration System also provides for dissemination of
market information to facilitate negotiations, coordination of matching
Class A IFQ held by harvesters to IPQ held by processors, and the
opportunity to use the binding arbitration process to resolve terms of
price and delivery. Certain aspects of the Arbitration System are
required of catcher vessel owners who hold QS/IFQ and PQS/IPQ holders
and operate regardless of whether participants in the fishery actually
initiate binding arbitration in order to resolve terms of price or
delivery.
This information collection contains five components of the
Arbitration System that are submitted to NMFS. Four are submitted
annually: the Annual Arbitration Organization Report, the Market
Report, the Non-binding Price Formula Report, and the Cost Allocation
Agreement. The Contract Arbitrator Report is submitted if any
arbitrations occur within a fishery.
The Annual Arbitration Organization Report is compiled by each of
the two arbitration organizations; one organization represents the
processors, and the second represents the harvesters. This report
includes information on the arbitration organization and its management
personnel, the crab QS fisheries to which the report applies, the
ownership interest and the QS/IFQ or PQS/IPQ held by each member; and
the arbitration process.
The Cost Allocation Agreement provides combined shared arbitration
accounting costs. Federal regulations for the Crab Rationalization
Program require that the crab arbitration costs are shared equally
between IPQ holders and Class A IFQ holders--processors pay half and
fishermen pay half.
The arbitration organizations use contracted parties to meet the
requirements of the Market Report, Nonbinding Price Formula Report, and
Contractor Arbitrator Report.
The Non-binding Price Formula Report is a pre-season report that is
designed to serve as a starting point for negotiations between
fishermen and processors, or as a starting point for an arbitrator in
evaluating offers in an arbitration process. This report documents how
each formula was developed.
The Market Report provides an analysis of the market for products
of a specific crab fishery and reports on
[[Page 8413]]
activities occurring within three months prior to its generation. The
purpose of this report is to provide background information on each
crab fishery, the products generated by each fishery, and position of
those products in the marketplace; discuss the historical division of
wholesale revenue; and provide the methods for predicting wholesale
prices before the fishery occurs.
The Contract Arbitrator Report documents arbitration proceedings if
they occur within a fishery.
Affected Public: Individuals or households; Business or other for-
profit organizations.
Frequency: Annually; As needed.
Respondent's Obligation: Mandatory.
Legal Authority: Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and
Management Act (16 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.).
This information collection request may be viewed at
<a href="http://www.reginfo.gov">www.reginfo.gov</a>. Follow the instructions to view the Department of
Commerce collections currently under review by OMB.
Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information
collection should be submitted within 30 days of the publication of
this notice on the following website <a href="http://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain">www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain</a>.
Find this particular information collection by selecting ``Currently
under 30-day Review--Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search
function and entering either the title of the collection or the OMB
Control Number 0648-0516.
Sheleen Dumas,
Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of the Under Secretary for
Economic Affairs, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2024-02508 Filed 2-6-24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-22-P
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