SENT VIA UPS &

ELECTRONIC MAIL OR FAX

December 15, 2017

To: Importer/Customs Broker:

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Food Safety and Inspection 

Service (FSIS) is notifying you that it will discontinue its interim Third-Party Holdand-Test Protocol for Shipments of Siluriformes Fish and Fish Products. This 

action will be implemented December 18, 2017.

The final rule, “Mandatory Inspection of Fish of the Order Siluriformes and Products 

Derived from Such Fish,” published on December 2, 2015, and provided an 18-

month transitional period, until September 1, 2017, prior to full enforcement of the 

regulatory requirements of the mandatory inspection system. During the transitional 

period, FSIS conducted random and targeted sampling and testing of imported

Siluriformes fish and fish products. When FSIS testing revealed imported

Siluriformes fish products with violative levels of drugs, pesticides, dyes, metals, 

nitrofurans, or other chemical residues, the Agency required the importers of record 

(IORs) sample and test subsequent shipments from the implicated foreign 

establishments through an accredited third-party laboratory. FSIS made decisions 

for these subsequent shipments based in part on the third-party testing results and 

evidence provided by the IOR that the shipments are chemically independent of the 

shipment found by FSIS to be positive for a violative chemical residue.

This letter is to inform you that, on December 18, 2017, FSIS is suspending the 

third-party testing requirement. In response to new violative findings for drugs, 

pesticides, dyes, metals, nitrofurans, and other chemical residues in Siluriformes fish 

and fish products, the Agency will implement an Intensified Level of Reinspection 

(LOR) sampling, as it does for other imported meat and poultry, based on the policy

outlined in FSIS Directive 9900.6, “Laboratory Sampling Program For Imported 

Meat, Poultry, and Egg Products.” 

Foreign establishments currently subject to the interim Third-Party Hold-and-Test

Protocol will be transitioned to an Increased LOR for the applicable residue types of 

inspection (TOI) until 15 consecutive lots pass FSIS reinspection. 

As outlined in Directive 9900.6, the LOR, relative to sampling, is assigned at one of 

three levels:

Food Safety and 

Inspection Service

1400 Independence 

Avenue, SW.

Washington, D.C.

20250
1. Normal - randomly selected lots based on the annual sampling plan,

2. Increased - targeted based on a FSIS management decision, and

3. Intensified - automatically generated after a lot fails a TOI. 

If an import shipment fails reinspection, the result is recorded in the Agency’s Public

Health Information System (PHIS), which assigns the TOI at the applicable LOR. 

PHIS will automatically generate an Intensified rate of reinspection for the failed 

TOI. For example, a failure for a violative chemical residue will result in an 

assignment of residue sampling for the next 15 lots (and/or 15 times the weight of 

the failed lot) of the same or similar products from the same producing foreign 

establishment. Products that fail reinspection are refused entry into the United 

States. If an IOR would like to appeal a failed TOI, they should go through the 

appropriate chain of command within the Office of Field Operations.

Please submit any questions to foimports@fsis.usda.gov.

Sincerely,

William (Bill) Smith

Assistant Administrator

Office of Field Operations