Notice of Request for Approval of a Revision of a Currently Approved Information Collection Request

Issuing agencies

Abstract

In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. Chapter 35), this notice announces the intention of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to request approval for a revision of a currently approved information collection request for the Agricultural Foreign Investment Disclosure Act of 1978 (AFIDA).

Full Text

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<title>Federal Register, Volume 91 Issue 208 (Thursday, October 29, 2026)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 91, Number 208 (Thursday, October 29, 2026)]
[Notices]
[Pages 68102-68104]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2026-22043]


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Notices
                                                Federal Register
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Federal Register / Vol. 91, No. 208 / Thursday, October 29, 2026 / 
Notices

[[Page 68102]]



DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE


Notice of Request for Approval of a Revision of a Currently 
Approved Information Collection Request

AGENCY: Office of Homeland Security, Departmental Administration, 
Department of Agriculture.

ACTION: Notice and request for comments.

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SUMMARY: In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 
U.S.C. Chapter 35), this notice announces the intention of the United 
States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to request approval for a 
revision of a currently approved information collection request for the 
Agricultural Foreign Investment Disclosure Act of 1978 (AFIDA).

DATES: Comments on this notice must be received by December 28, 2026 to 
be assured of consideration.

ADDRESSES: USDA invites interested persons to submit comments on this 
notice. Comments may be submitted, identified by OMB Control Number 
0509-0001, by one of the following methods:
    <bullet> Federal eRulemaking Portal: This website provides the 
ability to type short comments directly into the comment field on this 
web page or attach a file for lengthier comments. Go to <a href="https://www.regulations.gov">https://www.regulations.gov</a>. Follow the on-line instructions at that site for 
submitting comments.
    <bullet> Mail, including CD-ROMs, etc.: Send to ATTN: AFIDA, Office 
of Homeland Security, USDA, 1400 Independence Ave. SW, Room 1457-S, 
Mail Stop 5050, Washington, DC 20250-3700.
    <bullet> Hand- or courier-delivered submittals: Deliver to ATTN: 
AFIDA, Office of Homeland Security, USDA, 1400 Independence Ave. SW, 
Room 1457-S, Mail Stop 5050, Washington, DC 20250-3700. You may also 
send comments to the Desk Officer for Agriculture, Office of 
Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, 
Washington, DC 20503.
    Instructions: All items submitted by mail or electronic mail must 
include the Agency name and OMB Control Number 0509-0001. Comments 
received in response to this docket will be made available for public 
inspection and posted without change, including any personal 
information, to <a href="https://www.regulations.gov">https://www.regulations.gov</a>.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Contact Mr. Matt Allen, Director, USDA 
Office of Homeland Security, U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1400 
Independence Ave. SW, Washington, DC 20250, (202) 690-2681.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 
    Title: AFIDA Report.
    OMB Number: 0509-0001.
    Expiration Date of Approval: 09/30/2028.
    Type of Request: Revision of a currently approved information 
collection request.
    Abstract: AFIDA requires foreign persons who acquire, transfer, or 
hold interest in U.S. agricultural land to report such transactions to 
the Secretary of Agriculture on an AFIDA Report (FSA-153). USDA makes 
reports available to States--as statutorily required--, uses collected 
information to prepare an annual report to Congress, and makes reports 
available for public inspection in accordance with regulations that are 
also statutorily required. The AFIDA statute of authority is 92 STAT 
(1263-1267) or 7 U.S.C. 3501 et seq. or Public Law 95-460. The 
regulation was promulgated at 7 CFR part 781; however, USDA has 
proposed updates and is in process of transferring the regulation to a 
new CFR chapter (7 CFR part 5100) that will supersede 7 CFR part 781. 
Separate but complementary to the rulemaking process, general oversight 
of AFIDA authorities was delegated from the Farm Service Agency (FSA) 
to the Assistant Secretary for Administration (ASA) on April 13, 2026. 
The proposed rule further codifies subdelegation of authority to the 
Office of Homeland Security (OHS) which organizationally falls under 
the ASA. AFIDA regulations were last updated in 2006. Since that time, 
national security attention to foreign ownership or substantial control 
of agricultural land has increased. Committee on Foreign Investment in 
the United States (CFIUS) agencies, including the U.S. Department of 
War, use USDA information from AFIDA filings to identify and review 
transactions that may pose national security risks, such as the 
location of agricultural land near sensitive military bases. Recent 
analyses, including a report by the Government Accountability Office 
(GAO), have identified flaws in USDA's processes for collecting, 
tracking, and sharing AFIDA data. These deficiencies, combined with 
evolving national security concerns and a Consolidated Appropriations 
Act, 2023 requirement for USDA to develop a streamlined process for 
electronic submission and retention of AFIDA disclosures, led USDA to 
create an electronic version of the FSA-153 form and update AFIDA 
regulations through the rulemaking process. USDA invites public input 
on the modernized changes that would improve information collection 
activities in a manner responsive to national security.
    Under the updated reporting requirements of the proposed rule, USDA 
will collect additional information from the public through changes to 
the electronic FSA-153 form (OMB 0509-0001, expiration date 09/30/
2028). The changes in the form fall into three general categories: 
consolidation and reordering certain questions, refinement of certain 
questions, and the addition of certain questions.
    These changes are reflected in the revised electronic FSA-153 form:
    <bullet> Item 1, ``Reportable Activity''--This item appears as Item 
1 in the current form but is renamed from ``Type of Activity'' to 
``Reportable Activity'' to more directly reference the legal 
responsibility of the filer to report their agricultural activity. 
Additionally, the proposed rule expands the list of persons that must 
file an AFIDA report to include: (i) all beneficial owners regardless 
of nominal share or interest; (ii) any U.S. business with at least 10 
percent of its interest held by a foreign person(s), regardless of 
whether or not the persons act in concert with regard to such interest; 
(iii) any foreign person holding a lease or easement of 1 year or more; 
(iv) any foreign adversary or foreign adversary controlled entity 
holding a lease or easement of any duration; and (v) any foreign person

[[Page 68103]]

who holds, acquires, or transfers any interest in the expanded 
definition of agricultural land, which under the proposed rule includes 
agricultural industries (organized by NAICS codes) previously absent 
from the AFIDA regulations and land in conservation that could be used 
for farming, ranching, forestry, or timber production. Given that the 
proposed rule would expand the persons and activities requiring an 
AFIDA report, USDA will modify the list of selectable options under 
Item 1 accordingly to include: (i) ``Land Holding Newly Reportable 
under 2026 Update to AFIDA Regulations''; (ii) ``Land Acquisition 
(including Lease or Easement)''; (iii) ``Land Transfer''; (iv) 
``Expiration or Termination of Lease or Easement''; and (v) ``Land Use 
Change to Agriculture.'' Once a filer selects an option, subsequent 
items on the form will only display questions applicable to the 
selected activity reducing confusion on which fields are required. USDA 
will remove ``Land Use Change to Non-Agriculture'' from the list of 
selectable options since this activity will be captured under a new 
amendment platform available on the electronic AFIDA portal.
    <bullet> Item 2, ``Person Information''--This item appears as Item 
4 in the current FSA-153 but has been moved to Item 2 since information 
provided under this item applies to holdings reported in subsequent 
items of the form. This item contains all the information captured in 
Item 4 on the current form as well as new additions. ``Limited 
Liability Company (LLC)'' is added to the list of organization types, 
as many foreign person filers are LLCs and have previously marked the 
``other'' box and wrote in ``LLC'' for the item indicating ``explain.'' 
Additionally, this item now requires all owners to provide ``Tax ID 
Type'' and ``Tax ID Number'' inclusive of all of the following: 
``Employee Identification Number (EIN)'', ``Social Security Number 
(SSN)'', ``Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN)'', 
``Foreign Tax Identification Number'', and ``Foreign Passport Number''. 
There will also be a ``I do not have a Tax ID'' option. We are asking 
for this ID information as such information ensures the identity of the 
filers and, consequently, the integrity of their electronic filings. 
All owners will also need to provide a ``Phone Number'' and ``Email 
Address''. Lastly, the proposed rule requires that filers provide a 
full ownership diagram to illustrate the connections between all 
interest holders in a standardized manner. This requirement expands the 
previous requirement of filers to provide ownership details only up to 
the third tier of ownership. Currently, filers are not asked for this 
information specifically; rather, they may indicate the ``ultimate'' 
foreign interest with a dotted line from the third ownership tier to 
that ``ultimate'' or ``final'' foreign ownership interest on their 
schematic or listing. Without this diagram, we can only assume that the 
foreign interest ownership chain ends at the third tier (if no more 
information is provided); the lack of complete data shared often masks 
the foreign country(ies) associated in full or in part. This 
information must be captured in the electronic form to provide an 
accurate annual report to Congress regarding foreign holdings and to 
answer national security (and other) questions regarding foreign 
ownership of U.S. agricultural land. The final rule will provide the 
final definition of ultimate owner.
    <bullet> Item 3, ``Land Location and Description''--This item 
contains all the information captured in Item 2 on the current form as 
well as new additions. This item adds ``Legal Mailing Address of the 
Land (if applicable)'' and ``Farm Service Agency (FSA) Farm Number (if 
applicable)'' as fields for responses. This item also clarifies that 
filers can report multiple holdings in multiple states or counties 
using the updated electronic FSA-153 form. USDA believes this 
enhancement will allow filers to more easily report several holdings 
associated with the same transaction and ease the reporting burden for 
large, complicated transactions. Currently, legal descriptions are the 
sole method to determine a holding's location, and their incompleteness 
and/or outdated descriptions can make it difficult or impossible to 
determine the actual location of the land prohibiting our ability to 
determine national security risks. As such, filers will need to use the 
electronic form's GIS platform to draw a polygon on the map depicting 
their holding's geographic position and delineate within their polygon 
current land uses by area. The electronic form will provide assistive 
tools to complete this requirement. Note that filers must continue to 
provide the legal description of the land, as has always been required.
    <bullet> Item 4, ``Current Land Use''--This item replaces Item 3 on 
the current form. This item will ask filers to provide the reportable 
holding's current land use breakdown by acres. Unlike the previous 
form, the electronic form will allow filers to search for their 
specific agricultural industry using a NAICS code lookup. Filers will 
have the opportunity to add as many NAICS codes as needed to describe 
their agricultural operations. Filers will also have the ability to 
declare ``Mixed Use'' land--that is, acreage that is being used for 
greater than one separate activity simultaneously. Last, filers will 
have the ability to assign acreage to each of the following categories: 
``Residential'', ``Idle'', ``Unknown'' and ``Other.''
    <bullet> Item 5, ``Intended Land Use''--This item replaces Item 8 
on the current form. This item will present the same options as 
described in Item 4 above but will apply to the filer's intended land 
use of the reportable holding. The information captured in Item 4 and 
Item 5 is necessary to provide an accurate annual report to Congress 
regarding foreign uses of U.S. agricultural land.
    <bullet> Item 6, ``Type of Interest Held in the Agricultural 
Land''--This item contains all the information captured in Item 5 on 
the current form as well as new additions. Given the volume of leases 
reported through AFIDA, this item adds ``Lease or Easement'' as a 
selectable option with an embedded question ``What is the expected 
expiration date of the lease or easement?'' This item also provides a 
text box for filers to provide additional information if they select 
the ``Other'' option. USDA believes these additional options allow 
filers to more easily provide specificity that is absent in the current 
form.
    <bullet> Item 7, ``How was the Holding Acquired or Transferred?''--
This item contains all the information captured in Item 6 on the 
current form as well as new additions. This item adds ``Loan/Mortgage 
Provider'' and ``Loan/Mortgage ID'' as embedded questions under the 
``Credit or Installment Transaction'' option so that filers can provide 
USDA more information about the credit or installment transaction. This 
item also provides a text box for filers to provide additional 
information if they select the ``Other'' option. Lastly, this item adds 
two new selectable options to capture unique cases by which a filer may 
have acquired the holding: ``Property Acquired through Merger or 
Acquisition'' and ``Auction''.
    <bullet> Item 8, ``Value of Agricultural Land''--This item contains 
all the information captured in Item 7 on the current form as well as 
an addition/deletion. USDA has determined that information received by 
responses to the question ``How much of purchase price remains to be 
paid?'' has not been utilized; thus, there is no reason to continue to 
collect this information. Instead, this item will add ``Most recent tax 
assessed Value at time of submission'' as a required question. USDA 
requires this information to monitor the differences between 
transaction prices and tax assessed

[[Page 68104]]

values, which will be used in calculations of the land's Fair Market 
Value.
    <bullet> Item 9, ``Prior Relationship''--This item replaces Item 9 
and Item 10 on the current form. This item comprises two questions with 
``Yes, please explain'', ``No'' or ``Unknown'' responses: (i) ``To the 
best of your knowledge, did one or more Foreign Persons involved in 
this transaction have an existing business relationship with the 
holding's previous owner prior to the activity described in this 
disclosure?'' and (ii) ``To the best of your knowledge, was one or more 
Foreign Persons involved in this transaction involved in the day-to-day 
operations of the holding prior to the activity described in this 
disclosure?'' The purpose of this information collection is to monitor 
the origination of transactions subject to AFIDA to enable USDA to 
fulfill its statutory responsibility to analyze the impacts of foreign 
land ownership on farms and rural communities.
    <bullet> Item 10, ``Land Recipient Information (for Land Transfer 
only)--This item only pertains to land dispositions and contains all 
the information captured in Item 11 on the current disposition form. 
This item adds ``Phone Number of Person Receiving Tract'' and ``Email 
Address of Person Receiving Tract'' to ensure that USDA has the 
relevant contact information to reach out to the recipient on an as-
needed basis. This item also adds clarifying language to request the 
``Country of Organization'' of the recipient if it is a business.
    <bullet> Item 11, ``Additional Holdings''--This item asks if the 
filer would like to add multiple holdings to their submission. If so, 
it redirects them back to Items 3-10 to fill in information for their 
additional holding(s). As noted above, USDA believes this ability to 
add multiple holdings will ease the reporting burden for filers with 
large, complicated transactions.
    <bullet> Item 12, ``Representative of Foreign Person''--This item 
replicates Item 12 on the current form asking if the filer is 
completing the form on behalf of someone else. If the filer selects 
``Yes'', the form asks the filer to ``Please explain and provide 
contact details for the Person on whose behalf you are completing this 
form.'' This additional information is needed to ensure that USDA has 
the correct contact information to directly reach the foreign person on 
whose behalf the representative is completing the AFIDA report.
    <bullet> Item 13, ``Certification and Signature''--This item 
replicates Item 13 on the current form.
    <bullet> Item 14, ``Additional Comments''--This item replicates 
Item 14 on the current form.
    <bullet> Item 15, ``Additional Attachments''--This item replicates 
Item 15 on the current form.
    Estimate of Burden: Public reporting burden for this collection of 
information is estimated to average 0.94 hours per response.
    Type of Respondents: Anticipated respondents include foreign 
persons subject to AFIDA reporting requirements or a third party 
operating on their behalf. This group includes foreign individuals, 
foreign governments, foreign-based businesses, and U.S. businesses with 
foreign ownership. USDA notes that foreign investors that are 
corporations, LLCs, trusts, and others often hire an attorney or have a 
corporate employee (also often in the legal field) complete the FSA-
153. About 90 percent of individuals who file also rely on an attorney 
representative. As such, USDA expects legal representatives to file the 
majority of AFIDA reports on behalf of their clients.
    Estimated Number of Respondents: We estimate the number of annual 
respondents to be 5,438 inclusive of 5,000 respondents submitting a new 
disclosure and 438 respondents updating existing submissions.
    Estimated Number of Responses: We estimate the number of annual 
responses to be 5,438 since each respondent will submit one electronic 
FSA-153 form.
    Estimated Number of Responses per Respondent: Each respondent 
submits one response.
    Estimated Total Annual Burden on Respondents: We estimate the total 
annual burden on respondents to be 5,109.5 hours. Currently, USDA 
estimates that it takes respondents 30 minutes to complete a new AFIDA 
submission and 15 minutes for updating an existing AFIDA report. USDA 
estimates that it will take respondents an additional 30 minutes to 
prepare the GIS map that we propose as a requirement in addition to the 
current 30 minutes to complete the form for a total of 1 hour per 
submission. The updated FSA-153 will include additional questions for 
filers; however, the proposed rule also mandates that filers complete 
and submit the form electronically via <a href="https://afida.landmark.usda.gov">https://afida.landmark.usda.gov</a> 
for greater efficiency. USDA believes these two changes in concert will 
ultimately be net neutral in the amount of time to complete the form. 
Summarizing these changes, we estimate the total annual burden on 
respondents to be 5,109.5 hours.
    Comments are invited on: (1) whether the proposed collection of 
information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of 
the agency, including whether the information will have practical 
utility; (2) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of the 
proposed collection of information including the validity of the 
methodology and assumptions used; (3) ways to enhance the quality, 
utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (4) ways 
to minimize the burden of the collection of information on those who 
are to respond, including the use of appropriate automated, electronic, 
mechanical, or other technological collection techniques or other forms 
of information technology. Comments may be submitted electronically or 
mailed to ATTN: AFIDA, Office of Homeland Security, USDA, 1400 
Independence Ave. SW, Room 1457-S, Mail Stop 5050, Washington, DC 
20250-3700; (202) 690-2681. All comments received will be available for 
public inspection during regular business hours at the same address by 
appointment only.
    This is a rule effectuated Paperwork Reduction Act process. 
Accordingly, any changes made to the final rule based on public comment 
will be reflected in the final form and certain information fields may 
be updated as appropriate to ensure alignment with regulations.
    All responses to this notice will be summarized and included in the 
request for OMB approval. All comments will become a matter of public 
record.

Matthew Allen,
Director, USDA Office of Homeland Security.
[FR Doc. 2026-22043 Filed 10-28-26; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3410-18-P


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