Draft bill 46.

Summary.

The draft bill develops paragraph 10 of Article 51 of Law 23 of 1997 in relation to agricultural quarantine activities. Its first article proposes that those activities may be delegated to a nongovernmental organization specializing in the subject. Delegation would take place through the Higher Office of the Ministry of Agricultural Development (Despacho Superior del MIDA), and the organization receiving the delegation could be domestic or international. This provision addresses the activities referred to in that paragraph, within the agricultural quarantine functions identified in the draft bill’s title.

For services, the second article would authorize the Ministry of Agricultural Development (Ministerio de Desarrollo Agropecuario) to set the fees charged for services provided by the Executive Directorate of Agricultural Quarantine (Dirección Ejecutiva de Cuarentena Agropecuaria). Under the proposed wording, the authority to set those fees belongs to the ministry. The article also provides that a nongovernmental organization specializing in the subject may collect and administer the fees. As with the organization contemplated for the delegation of activities, it could be domestic or international. The text thus addresses the setting of fees separately from the work of collecting and administering them.

Both provisions are permissive: they allow the stated activities to be delegated and allow fee collection and administration to be entrusted to a specialized nongovernmental organization. The first article identifies the Higher Office of the Ministry of Agricultural Development as the channel for delegating activities linked to paragraph 10 of Article 51 of Law 23 of 1997. The second places the setting of fees for the Executive Directorate of Agricultural Quarantine’s services with the Ministry of Agricultural Development and contemplates collection and administration by the specialized organization. The draft bill develops the reference to that law for these purposes without expressly amending its wording in the operative articles.

The third article provides that, if enacted, the measure would take effect on the day following its promulgation in the Official Gazette. The public bodies concerned by its provisions are the Higher Office of the Ministry of Agricultural Development, the Ministry of Agricultural Development and the Executive Directorate of Agricultural Quarantine. The provisions could be of interest to domestic or international nongovernmental organizations specializing in agricultural quarantine and to users of the directorate’s services, particularly in the agricultural sector.