Inspections then and now

The Congressional Research Service in March updated a report on Agro-Terrorism. Included in the report is some insight about border inspectors, frequent targets of criticism by industry leaders:

Adding Agriculture Specialists. Under the CBP cross-training initiative in 2003 (also known as “One Face at the Border”), CBP inspectors from the former customs, immigration, and agriculture agencies were to be trained to perform inspections in all three areas equally, without specialization, — customs, immigration, and agriculture. However, due to criticism from USDA, inspection unions, and the agricultural industry, DHS created another class of inspectors called “agriculture specialists.” Agriculture specialists work mainly in secondary inspection stations in passenger terminals and are deployed at cargo terminals. The cadre of agriculture specialists include former APHIS inspectors who decided not to convert to CBP generalist inspectors plus new graduates from the agricultural specialist training program. Before DHS was created, APHIS trained its inspectors in a nine-week course that had science prerequisites. The initial DHS cross-training program announced in 2003 had only 12-16 hours for agriculture in a 71-day course covering customs, immigration, and agriculture. This difference in training was one of the reasons DHS was forced to add the agricultural specialist position DHS now has an eight-week (43-day) training program for agriculture specialists. The course is taught by CBP and APHIS instructors at a USDA training facility in Frederick, Maryland. Agriculture specialists also receive two weeks of law enforcement training, and can exercise law enforcement authority similar to regular CBP officers. However, CBP does not necessarily allow agriculture specialists to use the full extent of their law enforcement powers. The first class of agriculture specialists graduated in July 2004. Regular CBP officers receive about 12-16 hours of agricultural training during their multi-week program at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) in Georgia. The agriculture module was developed by APHIS and provided to DHS. Although DHS is training new agriculture specialists, the future size of the agricultural specialist corps is not certain, given the eventual attrition of former APHIS inspectors. Also, details are not available as to how these inspectors will be deployed and how many ports of entry will be staffed with agriculture specialists (compared with the APHIS deployment prior to DHS). Without agriculture specialists, primary agricultural inspections — the first line of defense for agricultural security — may be conducted by cross-trained inspectors with limited agricultural training. Congressional agriculture committees have been concerned about whether enough attention will be devoted to agricultural inspections by DHS, and whether the United States will be as safe from the introduction of foreign pests as it was under the previous inspection system. Inspection statistics from the fall of 2003 indicate that 32% fewer insect infestations were found (under DHS) than in the previous year (under APHIS). APHIS officials cite unfilled agricultural inspector positions and difficulty in adequately cross-training former customs and immigration officers to conduct agricultural inspections.

TK: With the continued struggle to convert customs and immigration officials to capable inspectors for ag pests, the time may be right to switch back border inspection duties to the USDA.