[Federal Register Volume 79, Number 57 (Tuesday, March 25, 2014)]
[Notices]
[Pages 16330-16331]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2014-06448]


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FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION


Agency Information Collection Activities;Proposed Collection; 
Comment Request

AGENCY: Federal Trade Commission (``Commission'' or ``FTC'').

ACTION: Notice and request for public comment.

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SUMMARY: The FTC plans to conduct a study to examine consumer 
perception of environmental marketing claims. This is the first of two 
notices required under the Paperwork Reduction Act (``PRA'') in which 
the FTC seeks public comments on its proposed research before 
requesting Office of Management and Budget (``OMB'') review of, and 
clearance for, the collection of information discussed herein.

DATES: Comments must be received on or before May 27, 2014.

ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file a comment online or on paper, by 
following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write ``Green Marketing 
Consumer Perception Study, Project No. P954501'' on your comment, and 
file your comment online at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/organicstudypra, by following the instructions on the web-based form. 
If you prefer to file your comment on paper, mail or deliver your 
comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of 
the Secretary, Room H-113 (Annex J), 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., 
Washington, DC 20580.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Laura Koss, Attorney, 202-326-2890, or 
Hampton Newsome, Attorney, 202-326-2889, Division of Enforcement, 
Bureau of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

I. Background

    The Commission's Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing 
Claims (``Green Guides'' or ``Guides'') (16 CFR part 260) help 
marketers avoid making unfair and deceptive environmental claims.\1\ 
The Guides outline general principles that apply to all environmental 
marketing claims and provide guidance regarding specific categories of 
such claims.\2\ These categories include: General environmental benefit 
claims such as ``environmentally friendly''; degradable claims; 
compostable claims; recyclable claims; recycled content claims; source 
reduction claims; refillable claims; and ``free-of'' claims. The Green 
Guides explain how reasonable consumers are likely to interpret claims 
within these categories. The Guides also describe the basic elements 
necessary to substantiate claims and present options for qualifying 
them to avoid deception.\3\ The illustrative qualifications provide 
``safe harbors'' for marketers who want certainty, but do not represent 
the only permissible approaches. The Guides do not provide specific 
guidance regarding ``organic'' claims.
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    \1\ The Commission issued the Green Guides in 1992 (57 FR 36363) 
and subsequently revised them in 1996 (61 FR 53311), 1998 (63 FR 
24240), and 2012 (77FR 62121).
    \2\ 15 U.S.C. 45(a). The Commission's industry guides, such as 
the Green Guides, are administrative interpretations of the 
application of Section 5 of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. 45(a) to 
advertising claims. The Commission issues industry guides to provide 
guidance for the public to conform with legal requirements. These 
guides provide the basis for voluntary abandonment of unlawful 
practices by industry members. 16 CFR part 17. The Guides do not 
have the force and effect of law and are not independently 
enforceable. However, the Commission can take action under the FTC 
Act if a business makes environmental marketing claims inconsistent 
with the Guides. In any such enforcement action, the Commission must 
prove that the act or practice at issue is unfair or deceptive.
    \3\ The Guides do not, however, establish standards for 
environmental performance or prescribe testing protocols.
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II. The FTC's Proposed Study

A. Study Description

    The FTC plans to conduct Internet-based consumer research to 
explore consumer perceptions of certain environmental marketing claims, 
such as ``organic'' and ``pre-consumer recycled content,'' to enhance 
the Commission's understanding of how consumers interpret such claims. 
The proposed study will compare participant responses regarding the 
meaning of such environmental marketing claims across different product 
variations. Specifically, using a treatment-effect methodology, the 
study will examine whether respondents viewing organic and recycled 
content claims believe that these products have particular 
environmental benefits or attributes depending on the context in which 
they are presented. For ``recycled content'' claims, the study will 
present questions about products produced with materials sourced under 
different scenarios and compare participant responses to those 
scenarios. Such materials described in the questions may come from 
products recycled by consumers or may derive from scraps that are left 
over from manufacturing other products and reprocessed to varying 
degrees. The study will also

[[Page 16331]]

examine how respondents understand the term ``organic'' in a variety of 
contexts. The FTC staff will use the study results, along with other 
information such as public comments, in considering whether to 
recommend that the Commission propose revisions to the Green Guides.
    Having considered the costs and benefits of various data collection 
methods, the FTC staff has concluded that an Internet panel with 
nationwide coverage will provide the most efficient way to collect data 
to meet the research objectives within a feasible budget. Thus, the FTC 
proposes to collect responses from a broad spectrum of the U.S. adult 
population. Participants will be drawn from an Internet panel 
maintained by a commercial firm that operates the panel. All 
participation will be voluntary. While the results will not be 
generalizable to the U.S. population, the Commission believes that they 
will provide useful insights into consumer understanding of the claims 
being considered.

B. PRA Burden Analysis

    Staff estimates that respondents will require, on average, 20 
minutes to complete the questionnaire. Staff will pretest the 
questionnaire with approximately 100 respondents to ensure that all 
questions are easily understood. Allowing for an extra three minutes 
for questions unique to the pretest, the pretest will total 
approximately 38 hours, cumulatively (100 respondents x 23 minutes 
each). Once the pretest is completed, the FTC plans to seek information 
from up to 8,000 respondents for approximately 20 minutes each. Thus, 
respondents will cumulatively take approximately 2,700 hours. The cost 
per respondent should be negligible. Participation will not require 
start up, capital, or labor expenditures.

III. Request for Comment

    Under the PRA, 44 U.S.C. 3501-3521, federal agencies must obtain 
approval from OMB for each collection of information they conduct or 
sponsor. ``Collection of information'' means agency requests or 
requirements that members of the public submit reports, keep records, 
or provide information to a third party.\4\ As required by Section 
3506(c)(2)(A) of the PRA, the FTC is providing this opportunity for 
public comment before requesting that OMB extend the existing paperwork 
clearance for the regulations noted herein.
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    \4\ 44 U.S.C. 3502(3); 5 CFR 1320.3(c).
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    Pursuant to Section 3506(c)(2)(A) of the PRA, the FTC invites 
comments on: (1) Whether the reporting requirements are necessary, 
including whether the information will be practically useful; (2) the 
accuracy of our burden estimates, including whether the methodology and 
assumptions used are valid; (3) ways to enhance the quality, utility, 
and clarity of the information to be collected; and (4) ways to 
minimize the burden of the collection of information.
    You can file a comment online or on paper. For the Commission to 
consider your comment, we must receive it on or before May 27, 2014. 
Write ``Green Marketing Consumer Perception Study, Project No. 
P954501'' on your comment. Your comment--including your name and your 
state--will be placed on the public record of this proceeding, 
including, to the extent practicable, on the public Commission Web 
site, at http://www.ftc.gov/os/publiccomments.shtm. As a matter of 
discretion, the Commission tries to remove individuals' home contact 
information from comments before placing them on the Commission Web 
site.
    Because your comment will be made public, you are solely 
responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any 
sensitive personal information, like anyone's Social Security number, 
date of birth, driver's license number or other state identification 
number or foreign country equivalent, passport number, financial 
account number, or credit or debit card number. You are also solely 
responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any 
sensitive health information, like medical records or other 
individually identifiable health information. In addition, do not 
include any ``[t]rade secret or any commercial or financial information 
which is . . . privileged or confidential,'' as discussed in Section 
6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 16 CFR 
4.10(a)(2). In particular, do not include competitively sensitive 
information such as costs, sales statistics, inventories, formulas, 
patterns, devices, manufacturing processes, or customer names.
    If you want the Commission to give your comment confidential 
treatment, you must file it in paper form, with a request for 
confidential treatment, and you have to follow the procedure explained 
in FTC Rule 4.9(c), 16 CFR 4.9(c).\5\ Your comment will be kept 
confidential only if the FTC General Counsel grants your request in 
accordance with the law and the public interest.
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    \5\ In particular, the written request for confidential 
treatment that accompanies the comment must include the factual and 
legal basis for the request, and must identify the specific portions 
of the comment to be withheld from the public record. See FTC Rule 
4.9(c), 16 CFR 4.9(c).
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    Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to 
heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit 
your comments online. To make sure that the Commission considers your 
online comment, you must file it at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/organicstudypra, by following the instructions on the web-based 
form. If this Notice appears at http://www.regulations.gov/#!home, you 
also may file a comment through that Web site.
    If you file your comment on paper, write ``Green Marketing Consumer 
Perception Study, Project No. P954501'' on your comment and on the 
envelope, and mail or deliver it to the following address: Federal 
Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Room H-113 (Annex J), 600 
Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Washington, DC 20580. If possible, submit your 
paper comment to the Commission by courier or overnight service.
    Visit the Commission Web site at http://www.ftc.gov to read this 
Notice and the news release describing it. The FTC Act and other laws 
that the Commission administers permit the collection of public 
comments to consider and use in this proceeding as appropriate. The 
Commission will consider all timely and responsive public comments that 
it receives on or before May 27, 2014. You can find more information, 
including routine uses permitted by the Privacy Act, in the 
Commission's privacy policy, at http://www.ftc.gov/ftc/privacy.htm.

    By direction of the Commission.
Donald S. Clark,
Secretary.
[FR Doc. 2014-06448 Filed 3-24-14; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6750-01-P