Subject

This directive sets the circumstances under which Canada will provide notification to the National Plant Protection Organization (NPPO) of an exporting country when a shipment of plants, plant products or other regulated articles has not complied with Canadian phytosanitary import requirements. The directive also describes the process for issuing notices of non-compliance, including who in Canada is responsible for writing, reviewing and sending the notifications, to whom the notifications should be sent and the format for these notifications.

This is the first revision to this policy directive. The objective of the revision is to clarify the situations under which notifications of non-compliance should be issued and also to reflect the organizational distinction between the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) and the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). In addition, this revision clarifies the procedures that the CFIA will follow when it receives a notification of non-compliance or emergency action from from another country in relation to plants, plant products or other regulated articles exported from Canada.

This policy is intended to complement other policy directives which identify actions to be carried out upon findings of non-compliance with Canadian phytosanitary requirements.

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Table of Contents

• Review
• Endorsement
• Amendment Record
• Distribution
• Introduction
• Scope
• References
• Definitions, Abbreviations and Acronyms
• 1.0 General Requirements
  • 1.1 Legislative Authority
  • 1.2 Fees
• 2.0 Specific Requirements
  • 2.1 Notifications of non-compliance or emergency action
  • 2.2 Significant instances of non-compliance
  • 2.3 Emergency Action
  • 2.4 Sending notifications from CFIA to exporting countries
    • 2.4.1 Program Manager, Plant Products sends the notifications
    • 2.4.2 Issuance of the notice of non-compliance or emergency action
    • 2.4.3 Information in the notification
  • 2.5 Receiving notifications from importing countries
• 3.0 Appendices
  • Appendix 1: Format for notifications issued by the CFIA

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Review

This directive will be reviewed every 5 years unless otherwise needed. The next review date for this directive is June 30, 2014. The contact for this directive is Joanne Rousson. For further information or clarification, please contact the CFIA.

Endorsement

Approved by:

Chief Plant Health Officer

Amendment Record

Amendments to this directive will be dated and distributed as outlined in the distribution below.

Distribution

1. Directive mail list (Regions, PHRA, USDA)
2. Provincial Government, Industry (via Regions)
3. National Industry Organizations (determined by Author)
4. Internet

Introduction

The revised International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC), 1997 states that importing countries shall, as soon as possible, inform the exporting country of significant instances of non-compliance with phytosanitary certification. The exporting country should investigate and on request, report the result of its investigation to the importing country. Countries may take appropriate emergency action on the detection of a pest.

On April 6, 2001, the Interim Commission on Phytosanitary Measures adopted the International Standard for Phytosanitary Measures (ISPM) No. 13: Guidelines for the Notification of Non-compliance and Emergency Action. This ISPM provides guidance on how to meet the notification obligations under the IPPC. This directive outlines the Canadian policy implementing the ISPM.

In the past, often only the importer was informed when a consignment was detained, treated, refused entry or returned to origin. Official exchange of information between the governments of the importing and exporting countries did not usually take place. For products exported from Canada, when the importer contacted the exporter, it was difficult for CFIA to find out details of the reasons for the refusal or detention. For non-compliant imports into Canada, notifying the Canadian importer would not necessarily result in better compliance the next time the same product was imported from the same country. Having a more formal mechanism for notification will allow better follow-up and correction of the situation so that recurrence is avoided. It will also allow CFIA to identify instances of repeated non-compliance originating from the same exporter, or the same exporting country, and to take further actions to avoid further instances, including the possibility of increased import inspections, identifying alternative certification mechanisms, or prohibitions.

Scope

This directive is for the use of Policy and Programs and Operations staff of the CFIA, including the Import Service Centres; CBSA; Importers and Exporters. This directive describes the process for the issuance of notices of non-compliance and the process that CFIA will use to respond to notices of non-compliance issued by foreign NPPOs.

References

ISPM No. 5, Glossary of Phytosanitary Terms, FAO, Rome (updated annually)

ISPM No. 13, Guidelines for the notification of non-compliance and emergency action, FAO, Rome, 2001

New Revised Text of the International Plant Protection Convention, FAO, Rome, 1997

Definitions, Abbreviations and Acronyms

Definitions for terms used in the present document can be found in the Plant Health Glossary of Terms.

1.0 General Requirements

1.1 Legislative Authority

The Plant Protection Act, S.C. 1990, c.22
The Plant Protection Regulations, SOR/95-212
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency Fees Notice, Canada Gazette, Part I (05/13/2000)

1.2 Fees

The CFIA is charging fees in accordance with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency Fees Notice. For information regarding fees associated with imported product, please contact the Import Service Centres (ISC) at the following phone numbers: Eastern ISC 1-877-493-0468; Central ISC 1-800-835-4486; Western ISC 1-888-732-6222. Anyone requiring other information regarding fees may contact any local CFIA office or Canadian Food Inspection Agency Fees Notice website.

2.0 Specific Requirements

2.1 Notifications of non-compliance or emergency action

A notification of non-compliance or emergency action is the official communication between national plant protection organizations to inform each other when a shipment of plants, plant products or other regulated articles did not meet the import requirements of the importing country. The CFIA may either send or receive notifications of non-compliance or emergency action. The CFIA will notify an exporting country's NPPO when consignments from the exporting country significantly fail to comply with Canada's phytosanitary import requirements. An importing country's NPPO notifies the CFIA when consignments from Canada fail to comply with its phytosanitary import requirements.

There are four main situations for which notifications may be issued:

• A significant instance of failure of an imported consignment to comply with specified phytosanitary requirements, including the detection of specified regulated pests;
• A significant instance of failure of an imported consignment to comply with documentary requirements for phytosanitary certification ;
• An emergency action taken on the detection in an imported consignment of a regulated pest not listed as being associated with the commodity from the exporting country;
• An emergency action taken on the detection in an imported consignment of an organism posing a potential phytosanitary threat.

In the case of non-compliance, the notification is intended to help in investigating the cause of the non-compliance and to facilitate steps to avoid recurrence. In the case of emergency action, the notification is to report action that is taken upon the detection of a pest posing a potential phytosanitary threat, and to facilitate steps to avoid recurrence. The CFIA will use the same form (see appendix 1) for both types of notification.

2.2 Significant instances of non-compliance

A significant non-compliance would occur if the safety or health of Canada's plant resource base is potentially threatened. The following situations are considered significant non-compliance, and should result in the issuance of a notification to the NPPO in the exporting country:

• failure to comply with phytosanitary requirements published in regulations, directives, policies, and plant Permits to Import or other official documents;
• detection of regulated pests in a consignment;
• failure to comply with documentary requirements, including but are not limited to:
  • absence of Phytosanitary Certificates, when required;
  • uncertified alterations or erasures to Phytosanitary Certificates;
  • serious deficiencies in information on Phytosanitary Certificates, such as absence of a required additional declaration, missing name of importer or exporter, inadequate or insufficient information to determine the exact origin of the things covered by the Phytosanitary Certificate;
  • fraudulent Phytosanitary Certificates;
  • where permitted by directive, other documents such as greenhouse labels, fumigation certificates etc. which are used in lieu of a phytosanitary certificate and are subsequently found to have insufficient or incorrect essential information;
• presentation for import of prohibited things or consignments;
• prohibited articles in consignments, such as soil, prohibited plant species, untreated wood, etc.;
• evidence of failure of a specifically required treatment;
• repeated instances of the arrival of prohibited articles from a particular country, in small, non-commercial quantities such as those carried by passengers or sent by mail.

Even when a Phytosanitary Certificate was not required, a notification should be sent to the exporting country's NPPO, for example when a regulated pest is detected.

2.3 Emergency Action

Emergency actions are prompt phytosanitary actions (i.e. inspection, testing, destruction, surveillance, treatment) undertaken in new or unexpected phytosanitary situations. The following circumstances are situations that are considered an emergency action:

• Action taken on a consignment, because it was found to be infested with a pest that is not (yet) listed on the regulated pest list but that meets the criteria of a regulated pest.
• Action taken on a consignment because it was found infested with a regulated pest for which the consignment has not traditionally been considered to be a pathway.

If a consignment was found to be infested with a regulated pest which is known to be associated with the commodity in that consignment, the action taken is a normal phytosanitary action. The situation, irrespective of its seriousness, is not entirely new or unexpected.

In practice, the actual action taken, e.g. treatment, destruction, further inspection, may be the same, regardless of whether it is called an emergency action or a phytosanitary action.

In the case of an emergency action, the same standardized form should be used to inform the exporting country but the title should read Notification of Emergency Action rather than Notification of Non-Compliance.

2.4 Sending notifications from CFIA to exporting countries

2.4.1 Program Manager, Plant Products sends the notifications

The notice of non-compliance (NNC) is prepared by Operations staff (Import Service Centre, inspector or regional program officer). If the notice of non-compliance is prepared by an inspector or by staff at an Import Service Centre, it should be reviewed by a regional program officer. The regional program officer is responsible for sending the notice of non-compliance to the Program Network Specialist (PNS). The Program Network Specialist must carefully review the NNC for accuracy and completeness and must confirm that issuing a NNC is justified and appropriate, as per the criteria in Section 2.2 and 2.3. The PNS may decide to address the issue using another mechanism, such as education of importers and/or exporters or administering fines, etc. Finally the Program Network Specialist forwards the final version of the NNC to the Program Manager, Plant Products, with a recommendation to sign the NNC and forward the completed notification to the exporting country. In the case of non-compliant wood packaging material, it is the Director of the Forestry Division, rather than the Program Manager, who issues the NNC based on inspection, information and reports received from CBSA.

Notices should be sent to the official contact point in the exporting country. Contact points are listed on the web site for the IPPC. In the absence of a contact point, the notification should be sent to the NPPO of the exporting country, the address found on the same list. In general, the notification should be sent by e-mail as a PDF with a hard copy following via regular mail.

NOTE: For notices of non-compliance destined to the United States, only an electronic copy should be sent. The United States have informed the CFIA that a hard copy is not required if the notice is sent by e-mail.

A electronic copy of the notification should be sent to the appropriate National Manager in the CFIA with a copy to the International Standards Advisor, Export and Technical Standards Section. The National Manager should distribute the NNC or a summary of them to the PNS in each Area for further distribution to regional program officers and inspectors as deemed appropriate. This will ensure that regional program officers and inspectors are aware of interceptions being made in different parts of the country and can target similar imports in their region. This will also contribute to consistency in program delivery.

Operations staff is responsible for communicating the information regarding the notice of non-compliance or emergency action to the Canadian importer. Operations staff should inform the Canadian importer of: 1) what may be required to bring the shipment into compliance or 2) inform the importer that the shipment must be returned to origin or disposed of in Canada under the supervision of the CFIA.

The Export and Technical Standards Section of the Office of the Chief Plant Health Officer is responsible for entering all notifications issued by Canada in a database to ensure that necessary follow-up actions are taken where deemed necessary.

2.4.2 Issuance of the notice of non-compliance or emergency action

The NNC should be written by the inspector or employee of the Import Service Centre that makes a decision that the shipment is non-compliant. The NNC should be written in consultation with the RPO and/or Program network specialist. The notification should be sent within 2 weeks after a significant non-compliance has been confirmed and the first phytosanitary action has been taken. Timely notification allows the exporting country to conduct a proper follow-up action, if required and to prevent re-occurrence.

When CFIA/Operations staff intercepts a consignment that is not in compliance with Canada's phytosanitary import requirements, the Program Manager, Plant Products, should be informed via established channels of communication between Operations and Program Network Specialists. In cases where CBSA staff intercepts a consignment of wood packaging material that is not in compliance with Canada's phytosanitary import requirements, the Forestry Division needs to be informed. The Program Manager, Plant Products or the Director of the Forestry Division in cases of non-compliant wood packaging makes a final decision to determine if the instance is a significant non-compliance and if the notification needs to be sent to the exporting country. All details need to be provided to the Program Manager or to Director of the Forestry Division to enable them to make the decision and complete the notification form.

Examples:

• When a consignment is detained, pending confirmation of a pest identification, a significant non-compliance has not (yet) taken place. If the identification shows that the intercepted pest is not a regulated pest nor a pest of potential economic importance, the shipment had been in compliance and will be released. If the identification shows that the intercepted pest is regulated and/or of potential economic importance, action must be taken, significant non-compliance has occurred, and a notification must be sent;
• If a consignment was refused entry because a Phytosanitary Certificate was not issued or has significant shortcomings, a notification must be sent;
• A treatment prior to release from detention, because a required treatment was not applied or live regulated pests were found, is a phytosanitary action, and a notification must be sent;
• Absence of a Permit to Import, if one is required, although a significant non- compliance, would not be notified to the exporting country, because it is the importer's responsibility to have an import permit, not the exporter's. Of course, the phytosanitary requirements set out in the permit must be met by the exporter, and significant failure to meet those requirements should be notified.

2.4.3 Information in the notification

The standard form for the notification of non-compliance is attached as Appendix 1. All relevant fields should be completed. The abbreviation n/a should be included in cases where certain fields are not completed. The information should be sufficient for the exporting NPPO to be able to investigate the incident and to take steps to avoid recurrence. In cases where a phytosanitary certificate did not accompany the consignment, additional documentation should be attached to the notification to allow the exporting country to conduct the necessary follow-up action to prevent re-occurrence.

Always ensure that the address of the CFIA issuing office is inserted at the top of the form.

The following are elements of the form (see Appendix 1) which may require explanation:

"Type and quantity of material affected", provide the common name of the material, e.g. packing materials, nursery stock, fresh apples, machinery, etc.

"Reasons for interception", is a short description of the non-compliance. Examples could include: Phytosanitary certificate lacking, missing additional declaration, pest intercepted, soil intercepted, requirements in D-**-** were not met, etc.

"Reference number", a unique number that allows tracking and trace communications and actions associated with the non-compliant consignment. It will be assigned to each notification in the following format: CFIA- Area (W, O, Q, A) -Year- sequential number For example, the fourth notification issued in 2009 by the Ontario area should bear the following number: CFIA-O- 09-004. Additional numbers may be reported in this section such as the pest identification report number, the detention tag number, the number on the foreign Phytosanitary Certificate, the CFIA Permit to Import number or the number of the Notice of refuse entry.

"Commodity classes" are: plants for planting, bulbs and tubers, cut flowers, foliage and decorative branches, fresh fruit, root crops, fresh vegetables (non-root crops) and culinary herbs, horticultural seeds and pollen, tree nuts, dried plant material, grains and field crops, potatoes, forestry products, living organisms (other than plants) and other regulated commodities.

"Phytosanitary action taken": the phytosanitary action should be specifically described and the parts of the consignment affected by the actions identified. Action could include the following: rejection, treatment, destruction, etc.

"Phytosanitary requirements to which the non-compliance applies": is a description of the phytosanitary requirements that were not met i.e. missing phytosanitary certificate, presence of soil when soil is prohibited, presence of a regulated pest in the consignment, etc.

"Report": A report from the NPPO of the exporting country does not need to be requested every time. If the same non-compliance occurred repeatedly from the same country, or the non-compliance is very unexpected, very serious or if it occurs during a trail period, etc., a report should be requested. The decision to request a report should be made by the Program Network Specialist in consultation with the national manager for the commodity in question.

The inspector or regional program officer does not need to complete the "report requested" field which should only be completed by the program network specialist in consultation with the national manager.

2.5 Receiving notifications from importing countries

A notification sent by another NPPO to Canada, notifying of a significant non-compliance of a Canadian export with foreign import requirements, will likely be sent to Canada's International Standards Advisor, who is the IPPC contact point for the CFIA. However a bilateral agreement may exist which indicates that the notification is to be sent to the Chief Plant Health Officer or another person in the CFIA. A Foreign NPPO may send the notification to any person in the CFIA. In all instances, the notification should be forwarded to the Senior Export Specialist of the Export and Technical Standards Section of the CFIA and to the National Manager of the commodity section in question.

The Senior Export Specialist will:

1. Record the non-compliance in the CFIA non-compliance tracking database, including the information about the non-compliance (country, commodity, etc.) and if follow-up action was initiated.
2. Work with the commodity section in question, the Program Network Specialist and Operations to investigate the causes and determine solutions to the non-compliance.
3. Receive information from the commodity section as to the causes of the non-compliance, the outcome of the investigation and a detailed description of the measures that will be implemented to prevent future non-compliance.
4. If a report was requested by the importing NPPO, the final report will be prepared by the commodity section. The report will be sent by the Plant Health & Biosecurity Directorate to the official contact point of the importing NPPO, or to the requester of the report in the foreign NPPO.

3.0 Appendices

Appendix 1: Format for notifications issued by the CFIA

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Appendix 1

Format for Notifications Issued by the CFIA

Canadian Food Inspection Agency

Notification of Non-Compliance

To:

Plant Protection Organization of
c/o [Official contact point]

This is to inform that the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has intercepted a shipment not in compliance with Canadian phytosanitary requirements that originated from [name of country]. Below is the information on the interception.

Type and quantity of material affected:	Reasons for interception:
Reference number:
Name of the importing country:	Canada
Name of the exporting country:
Phytosanitary Certificate number:
Commodity class:
Scientific name (at least plant genus) for plants or plant products:
Name and address of consignee:
Name and address of consignor:
Date of phytosanitary action on the consignment:
Phytosanitary action taken:

Specific information regarding the nature of the non-compliance and emergency action including:

Identity of pest:

Problems with documentation:

Part of the consignment affected:

Phytosanitary requirements to which the non-compliance applies:

Additional information:

Report requested: Yes No

In order to avoid similar phytosanitary action, we would appreciate if you would ensure that future consignments meet Canadian phytosanitary requirements. For more information on these requirements, please do not hesitate to contact the Canadian Food Inspection Agency or access the Internet Web site at www.inspection.gc.ca.

Program Manager
Plant Products