As you know, among its responsibilities for aviation safety, FAA’s Aircraft Certification Service (Aircraft Certification) grants approvals (called type certificates) for new aircraft, engines, and propellers. Certification projects, which involve the activities to determine compliance of a new product with applicable regulatory standards and to approve products for certificates, are typically managed by one of Aircraft Certification’s local Figure offices (generally known as aircraft certification offices, or ACOs).1 lists the key phases in FAA’s process for issuing certificates for aviation products. As depicted in the figure, both the applicant company and Aircraft Certification staff are involved in each phase. Studies published since 1980, our prior work, industry stakeholders, and experts have long raised questions about the efficiency of FAA’s certification processes and varying interpretations and applications of its regulations in making compliance decisions during certification. Over time, FAA has implemented efforts to address these issues, but as we reported in July 2014,demand and its overall workload has increased. In 2013, FAA published a detailed implementation plan for addressing the six certification process recommendations, and, in January 2015, published a detailed implementation plan for addressing the six regulatory consistency recommendations. they persist as FAA faces greater industry As of April 2015, FAA has made progress in addressing the Certification Process Committee’s recommendations, but as we reported in January 2015, challenges remain that could affect successful implementation of the recommendations. FAA is implementing its plan for addressing the 6 certification process recommendations, which involves completing 14 initiatives. According to an April 2015 update that FAA provided to us, 13 initiatives were completed or were on track to be completed, and one will not meet planned milestones. Figure 2 illustrates the evolving status of the 14 initiatives based on the update reported by FAA. As figure 2 above indicates, 5 of the 14 certification process initiatives are related to improving FAA’s organization designation authorization (ODA) program. As of April 2015, FAA had completed three of the five ODA- related certification process initiatives, while the remaining two are expected to be completed by the end of 2015. In January 2015, we noted that industry stakeholders had emphasized the need for FAA to expand its use of the ODA program to better leverage its available resources in other needed areas (e.g., staff and other resources for processing foreign approval applications—which will be discussed later in this statement). For example, one aircraft manufacturer told us it is a practical necessity for FAA to expand its ODA program to (1) better utilize private sector expertise to keep pace with the growing aviation industry, (2) allow more aerospace products to reach the market sooner, and (3) increase the efficiency of the agency’s scarce resources. According to the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA), the key strength of ODA is FAA’s ability to delegate, at its discretion, certain certification activities and test data reviews to qualified individuals or specific manufacturers’ employees. In doing so, FAA can leverage its resources by delegating more of the lower priority work during the certification process, thereby enabling FAA to better concentrate its limited staff resources on the most pressing aspects of certification projects. Another manufacturer noted that without expanded use of the program by FAA, the additional cost associated with maintaining an ODA has begun to outweigh the benefits of having the authorization. As we found in July 2014, industry union representatives we spoke to also reported concerns about the lack of FAA resources to effectively expand the program. While one labor union agreed with the concept of ODA, representatives had concerns related to expanding the program in other areas because they contended that oversight of the program required significant FAA resources. Furthermore, the representatives told us that due to staffing shortages and increased workload, FAA did not have enough inspectors and engineers to provide the proper surveillance of the designees who had already been granted this authority. However, as we reported in January 2015, it is too soon for us to determine whether FAA’s initiatives adequately address the recommendations as intended, and in this case, specifically for expanding the use of the ODA program. According to the January 2015 regulatory consistency implementation plan, FAA closed two recommendations—one as not implemented and one as implemented in 2013—and plans to complete the remaining 4 by July 2016. Table 1 provides a summary of the recommendations and FAA’s plans for addressing them. As we found in January 2015, while FAA has made some progress, it is too soon for us to determine whether FAA’s planned actions adequately address the recommendations. However, in that report, we also found that challenges remain that could affect the successful implementation of FAA’s planned actions. Industry representatives continued to indicate a lack of communication with and involvement of stakeholders as a primary challenge for FAA in implementing the committees’ recommendations, particularly the regulatory consistency recommendations. However, FAA noted that the processes for developing and updating its plans for addressing the certification process and regulatory consistency recommendations have been transparent and collaborative, and that FAA meets regularly with industry representatives to continuously update them on the status of the initiatives and for seeking their input. We also reported in January 2015 that several industry representatives told us that FAA had not effectively collaborated with or sought input from industry stakeholders in the agency’s efforts to address the two sets of recommendations, especially the regulatory consistency recommendations. For instance, some stakeholders reported that FAA did not provide an opportunity for them to review and comment on the certification process implementation plan updates, and did not provide an opportunity for them to review and offer input on the regulatory consistency implementation plan. However, FAA reported meeting with various industry stakeholders in October 2014 to brief them on the general direction and high-level concepts of FAA’s planned actions to address each regulatory consistency recommendation. Since we reported in January 2015, FAA officials met with stakeholders of the Regulatory Consistency Committee in March 2015 to brief them and further clarify the plan to implement the regulatory consistency recommendations. According to FAA, they are planning to conduct quarterly briefings with the Committee stakeholders, starting in June 2015, to provide updates on the progress for addressing the four remaining recommendations. FAA officials also noted that while the implementation plan lists a completion date of March 2016 for the recommendation for developing the Master Source Guidance System— which FAA calls the Dynamic Regulatory System—this completion date is specifically for FAA’s efforts to determine the feasibility of including Office of Chief Counsel letters in the system. In terms of completing the development of the system, the officials told us they are currently ahead of the schedule outlined in the implementation plan and are working on finalizing the design concept for the new system. Once this process is completed, they would be able to provide a more accurate completion date for deployment of the system. According to one Committee stakeholder, it is important that FAA remain committed to creating the Master Source Guidance System, which was the Committee’s primary recommendation. In January 2015, we reported that, according to GAMA, the U.S. has historically been viewed as setting the global standard for the approval of aviation products internationally. Once U.S. aviation companies obtain a type certificate from FAA to use an aviation product in the United States, the companies often apply for approvals for the same products for use in other countries. In 2012, the U.S. aerospace industry contributed $118.5 billion in export sales to the U.S. economy, with this sector remaining strong in the European markets and growing in the emerging markets of Asia and the Middle East. Some countries accept the FAA approval outright as evidence that the product is safe for use in their country. Some other countries, however, do not accept the FAA certification and conduct their own approval processes for U.S. products, which can be lengthy, according to some U.S. industry stakeholders. These stakeholders have raised concerns that such practices provide no additional safety benefit and result in U.S. companies facing uncertainty and costly delays in delivering their products to foreign markets. FAA has taken steps to address these concerns, but FAA’s authority to address some of the challenges is limited because each country retains control of its basic regulatory framework for approving aviation products and ensuring the safety of those products for use in their countries—effectively a recognition of the sovereignty of each country. As counterparts to FAA, other countries’ civil aviation authorities—which we will refer to as foreign civil aviation authorities (FCAA)—approve domestically-manufactured aviation products for use in their respective countries. FCAAs also approve U.S. aviation products for use in their respective countries. These approvals are typically conducted within the parameters of bilateral aviation safety agreements (BASA), which are negotiated between FAA and other FCAAs. partnership agreements that provide a framework for the reciprocal approval of aviation products imported and exported between the U.S. According to FAA, it has 21 BASAs that affect 47 countries, including one BASA with the European Aviation Safety Agency that covers the European Union (EU) member nations. and other countries.approvals of U.S. aviation products from FCAAs. Representatives of the 15 selected U.S. aviation companies we interviewed for our January 2015 statement reported that their companies faced challenges related to process, communications, and cost in obtaining approvals from FCAAs. The processes involved included FCAAs’ individual approval processes as well as the processes spelled out in the relevant BASAs. In our January 2015 statement, we identified some efforts FAA is making to address these challenges, such as holding regular meetings with some bilateral partners—i.e., countries for which FAA has a BASA in place—and setting up forums in anticipation of issues arising. Reported FCAA process challenges. Of the 15 companies we interviewed, representatives from 12 companies reported mixed or varied experiences with FCAAs’ approval processes, and 3 reported positive experiences. Thirteen companies reported challenges related to delays, 10 reported challenges with approval process length, and 6 reported challenges related to FCAA staffs’ lack of knowledge or uncertainty about the approval processes, including FCAA requests for data and information that, in the companies’ views, were not needed for approvals.