Justification

The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), Office of Technology Evaluation currently receives 24,000 annual burden hours from OMB to conduct “Industrial Base Assessments (OMB Control No. 0694-0119). These hours have historically been sufficient to meet BIS requirements for surveys and related assessments. However, increased focus by policy –makers at the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security as well as the Armed Services concerning industrial supply chain erosion and foreign sourcing & critical dependencies has generated demand for a growing number of BIS surveys. BIS’s current OMB hours for FY 2011 are already effectively committed to industrial base activities with DHS, DOD and the Navy.

The request for additional burden hours (50,000) would be used in part for an expanded number of defense industrial base assessments with DOD and the Armed Services. (Note: the BIS request would increase the annual burden hours available to 74,000 for 2011 and out years). The President has asked DOD to reduce their overall budget by $100 billion. In meeting that request, the Services want to conduct detailed studies to determine if these proposed cuts will jeopardize the financial viability of key small and medium sized suppliers that support critical weapon systems. With BIS data in hand, the Services will be able to target cuts with minimal impact on key suppliers. BIS expects to receive formal requests to conduct surveys/studies on U.S. Shipbuilding, Aircraft, Bomb Fuzes, Electronics, Information Technology, and other critical sectors in the coming months.

In addition, the President's new National Space Policy, which was released in June 2010, requires the Department of Commerce, BIS to conduct an assessment of the U.S. Space Industrial Base. This is a tremendous undertaking as it covers all Intelligence Community, Defense Department, Civilian (NASA) and Commercial space related activities. BIS, in coordination with the interagency Space Industrial Base Council, is working to design a draft survey instrument by April 2011 and have it disseminated to industry by early summer 2011. This proposed timeline will have BIS on track to meet the White House study due date of March 2012.