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Prior to the passage of the 2018 Farm Bill, only existing trade barriers could be addressed under the program and TASC activities were limited to five years of funding. Industry groups requested Congress amend the law to broaden the types of trade barriers eligible under TASC and lengthen the period of funding eligibility. Section 3201 of the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, enacted on December 20, 2018, now allows program funds to be used to address potential sanitary, phytosanitary, and technical barriers to trade. The Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 also provided that [t]he Secretary may provide assistance under the program to a project for longer than a 5-year period if the Secretary determines that further assistance would effectively support the purpose described in paragraph (2). However, current TASC regulations provide for a 5-year limit on funding. See 7 CFR 1487.4 (b). The intended effect of this rulemaking is to amend the current regulations to align them with the statute by adding the word "potential" to the types of trade barriers the program will address and correcting 1487.4 (b) Length of activities to say that The Secretary may provide assistance under the program to a project for longer than a 5-year period if the Secretary determines that further assistance would effectively support the purposes of the program.

Overall Description of Deadline: Statutory Deadline is December 21, 2019.