30_day notice

Federal Register / Vol. 89, No. 189 / Monday, September 30, 2024 / Notices

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found in the Forest Plan; whether the
EIS has sufficient environmental
analysis to make an informed decision;
and whether the proposed action meets
the purpose and need for action. With
this information, the Responsible
Official must decide whether to select
the proposed action and what, if any,
additional actions should be required.
Substantive Provisions
Guidance for management of the
Monument comes from the 1985 Mount
St. Helens National Volcanic
Monument’s Comprehensive
Management Plan, which is fully
incorporated into the 1990 Gifford
Pinchot National Forest Land and
Resource Management Plan (Forest
Plan), as amended by the 1994 Record
of Decision for Amendments to Forest
Service and Bureau of Land
Management Planning Documents
within the Range of the Northern
Spotted Owl.
All actions authorized by the Forest
Service on National Forest System lands
must be consistent with the Forest Plan.
If a proposed project-specific action is
not consistent with the Forest Plan, the
Responsible Official may modify the
proposed action to make it consistent
with the plan, reject the proposed
action, or amend the plan such that the
action will be consistent with the plan,
as amended. When proposing a forest
plan amendment, the planning
regulations require the Responsible
Official to identify in this notice which
specific substantive requirements (36
CFR 219.8 through 219.11) are directly
related to the plan direction being
modified by the amendment based on
the purpose of the amendment or the
effects of the amendment (36 CFR
219.13(b)(5)).
The substantive requirements that are
likely directly related to the purpose of
the forest plan amendments are 36 CFR
219.8(a)(3)(i)(B), 219.8(a)(3)(i)(G), and
219.8(b)(1).
An amendment to Management Area
A Recreation—Planning and Inventory
standard and guideline 2 may be needed
to allow project activities within the
Monument and for potential road
upgrades along the road corridors of FS–
99 and FR–25 to exceed the Retention
VQO during project implementation.
The substantive requirements that are
likely directly related to the effects of
this forest plan amendment are 36 CFR
219.8(b)(2), 219.10(a)(1), and
219.10(b)(1)(i).
An amendment to Management Area
A Recreation—Use Administration
standard and guideline 2 may be needed
to allow for off-road vehicle during the
summer during project implementation.

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The substantive requirements that are
likely directly related to the effects of
this forest plan amendment are 36 CFR
219.8(a)(2)(ii), 219.10(a)(1), and
219.10(a)(5).
An amendment to Management Area
A Facilities—Road Operations standard
and guideline 1 may be needed to add
National Forest System road(s) in the
area. The substantive requirement that
is likely directly related to the effects of
this forest plan amendment is 36 CFR
219.10(a)(3).
An amendment to Management Area
A Facilities—Road Operations standards
and guidelines 2 and 3 may be needed
to allow for road and off-road vehicle
use on Deer and Elk Winter Range from
December 1 to April 1 during project
implementation. The substantive
requirements that are likely directly
related to the effects of this forest plan
amendment are 36 CFR 219.9(a)(1),
219.10(a)(1), and 219.10(a)(5).
Keith Lannom,
Associate Deputy Chief, National Forest
System.
[FR Doc. 2024–22159 Filed 9–27–24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3411–15–P

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
Census Bureau
Agency Information Collection
Activities; Submission to the Office of
Management and Budget (OMB) for
Review and Approval; Comment
Request; Business Enterprise
Research and Development Survey
The Department of Commerce will
submit the following information
collection request to the Office of
Management and Budget (OMB) for
review and clearance in accordance
with the Paperwork Reduction Act of
1995, on or after the date of publication
of this notice. We invite the general
public and other Federal agencies to
comment on proposed, and continuing
information collections, which helps us
assess the impact of our information
collection requirements and minimize
the public’s reporting burden. Public
comments were previously requested
via the Federal Register on May 29,
2024, during a 60-day comment period.
This notice allows for an additional 30
days for public comments.
Agency: U.S. Census Bureau,
Commerce.
Title: Business Enterprise Research
and Development Survey.
OMB Control Number: 0607–0912.
Form Number(s): BRD–1.
Type of Request: Regular submission,
Request for an Extension, without

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79511

Change, of a Currently Approved
Collection.
Number of Respondents: 47,500.
Average Hours per Response: 2 hours
and 37 minutes.
Burden Hours: 124,450.
Needs and Uses: The Census Bureau
is requesting clearance to continue to
conduct the Business Enterprise
Research and Development Survey
(BERD) for the 2024–2026 survey years
without change. Companies are the
major performers of research and
development (R&D) in the United States,
accounting for over 70 percent of total
U.S. R&D expenditures each year. A
consistent business R&D information
base is essential to government officials
formulating public policy, industry
personnel involved in corporate
planning, and members of the academic
community conducting research. To
develop policies designed to promote
and enhance science and technology,
past trends and the present status of
R&D must be known and analyzed.
Without comprehensive business R&D
statistics, it would be impossible to
evaluate the health of science and
technology in the United States or to
make comparisons between the
technological progress of our country
and that of other nations.
BERD is a joint statistical project
between the National Center for Science
and Engineering Statistics (NCSES)
within the National Science Foundation
(NSF) and the Census Bureau. The
National Science Foundation Act of
1950 as amended authorizes and directs
the National Science Foundation ‘‘. . .
to provide a central clearinghouse for
the collection, interpretation, and
analysis of data on scientific and
engineering resources and to provide a
source of information for policy
formulation by other agencies of the
Federal government’’ and the authority
was renewed by Section 505 of the
America COMPETES Reauthorization
Act of 2010. This mandate is fulfilled by
NCSES. One of the methods used by
NCSES to fulfill this mandate is the
BERD (and its predecessor surveys)—the
primary federal source of information
on R&D in the business sector. NCSES
together with the Census Bureau, the
collecting and compiling agent, analyze
the data and publish the resulting
statistics.
NCSES has published annual R&D
statistics collected from the Survey of
Industrial Research and Development
(1953–2007), the Business R&D and
Innovation Survey (2008–2016), the
Business Research and Development
Survey (2017 and 2018), and the
Business Enterprise Research and
Development Survey (2019–2023) for 70

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Federal Register / Vol. 89, No. 189 / Monday, September 30, 2024 / Notices

years. The results of the surveys are
used to assess trends in R&D
expenditures by industry sector,
investigate productivity determinants,
formulate science and tax policy, and
compare individual company
performance with industry averages.
This survey is the Nation’s primary
source for international comparative
statistics on business R&D spending.
BERD will continue to collect the
following types of information:
• R&D expense based on accepted
accounting standards.
• Worldwide R&D of domestic
companies.
• Business segment detail.
• R&D related capital expenditures.
• Detailed data about the R&D
workforce.
• R&D strategy and data on the
potential impact of R&D on the market.
Beginning in 2019, in an effort to
reduce burden, BERD began rotating
select content off the survey in
alternating years. In 2019, questions
related to intellectual property and
technology transfer were removed from
the survey. In 2020, questions related to
detail of R&D performed by others,
activities with academia, industries of
business and specific federal agency
funding R&D, and areas of application
for R&D were removed and the
intellectual property and technology
transfer questions rotated back on. This
cycle of rotating content has continued.
In 2021, the Capital Expenditures
section was revised to collect additional
information on assets. Proposed at that
time was to collect two consecutive
years of data (for 2021 and 2022) and
rotate select asset content off the survey
in alternating years. So, in 2023, BERD
would have had a subset of the asset
content, and in 2024, all of the asset
content would have been included on
the survey. This proposed content
rotation did not occur in 2023.
However, the rotation will commence in
2024. Resulting in a subset of the asset
content collected in 2024 and all of the
asset content collected in 2025 and so
on, similar to the other rotating content.
Census and NCSES will continue to
explore content that could be collected
less frequently than annual in an effort
to continue to reduce respondent
burden.
Information from BERD will continue
to support NCSES’ responsibility to
collect information on Research and
Development for overall support for
Federal policy discussions, as required
under the America COMPETES
Reauthorization Act of 2010.
Policy officials from many Federal
agencies rely on these statistics for
essential information. Businesses and

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trade organizations rely on BERD data to
benchmark their industry’s performance
against others. For example, total U.S.
R&D expenditures statistics are used by
the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA)
for incorporating R&D as fixed
investment in updates to the National
Income and Product Accounts (NIPAs).
Also, NCSES, BEA and the Census
Bureau periodically seek to use BERD
data to augment global R&D investment
information that is obtained from BEA’s
Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and
U.S. Direct Investment Abroad (USDIA)
surveys. Further, the Census Bureau
links data collected by BERD with other
statistical files. At the Census Bureau,
historical company-level R&D data are
linked to a file that contains information
on the outputs and inputs of companies’
manufacturing plants. Researchers can
analyze the relationships between R&D
funding and other economic variables
by using micro-level data.
Individuals and organizations access
the survey statistics via the internet in
annual InfoBriefs published by NCSES
that announce the availability of
statistics from each cycle of BERD and
detailed statistical table reports that
contain all the statistics NCSES
produces from BERD. Information about
the kinds of projects that rely on
statistics from BERD is available from
internal records of Census’ Center for
Economic Studies. In addition, survey
statistics are regularly cited in trade
publications and many researchers use
the survey statistics from these
secondary sources without directly
contacting NCSES or the Census Bureau.
Some of the users of the survey statistics
and the types of information they
request are described below.
Frequency: Annually.
Respondent’s Obligation: Mandatory.
Legal Authority: The survey is
conducted under the authority of Title
13, United States Code, Sections 8(b),
131, and 182; Title 42, United States
Code, Sections 1861–76 (National
Science Foundation Act of 1950, as
amended); and Section 505 within the
America COMPETES Reauthorization
Act of 2010.
This information collection request
may be viewed at www.reginfo.gov.
Follow the instructions to view the
Department of Commerce collections
currently under review by OMB.
Written comments and
recommendations for the proposed
information collection should be
submitted within 30 days of the
publication of this notice on the
following website www.reginfo.gov/
public/do/PRAMain. Find this
particular information collection by
selecting ‘‘Currently under 30-day

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Review—Open for Public Comments’’ or
by using the search function and
entering either the title of the collection
or the OMB Control Number 0607–0912.
Sheleen Dumas,
Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of
the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs,
Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2024–22361 Filed 9–27–24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510–07–P

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
Census Bureau
Agency Information Collection
Activities; Submission to the Office of
Management and Budget (OMB) for
Review and Approval; Comment
Request; Current Population Survey
(CPS) 2025 Field Test
Census Bureau, Commerce.
Notice of information collection,
request for comment.

AGENCY:
ACTION:

The Department of
Commerce, in accordance with the
Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of
1995, invites the general public and
other Federal agencies to comment on
proposed, and continuing information
collections, which helps us assess the
impact of our information collection
requirements and minimize the public’s
reporting burden. The purpose of this
notice is to allow for 60 days of public
comment on the proposed new
information collection, Current
Population Survey (CPS) 2025 Field
Test, prior to the submission of the
information collection request (ICR) to
OMB for approval.
DATES: To ensure consideration,
comments regarding this proposed
information collection must be received
on or before November 29, 2024.
ADDRESSES: Interested persons are
invited to submit written comments by
email to Kyra Linse, Survey Director,
Current Population Surveys via the
internet at [email protected]. Please
reference Current Population Survey
(CPS) 2025 Field Test in the subject line
of your comments. You may also submit
comments, identified by Docket Number
USBC–2024–0023, to the Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://
www.regulations.gov. All comments
received are part of the public record.
No comments will be posted to http://
www.regulations.gov for public viewing
until after the comment period has
closed. Comments will generally be
posted without change. All Personally
Identifiable Information (for example,
name and address) voluntarily
submitted by the commenter may be
SUMMARY:

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