2022-04174. Federal Acquisition Regulation; Federal Acquisition Circular 2022-05; Small Entity Compliance Guide

AGENCY:

Department of Defense (DoD), General Services Administration (GSA), and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

ACTION:

Small Entity Compliance Guide (SECG).

SUMMARY:

This document is issued under the joint authority of DoD, GSA, and NASA. This Small Entity Compliance Guide has been prepared in accordance with section 212 of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996. It consists of a summary of the rule appearing in Federal Acquisition Circular (FAC) 2022-05, which amends the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR). Interested parties may obtain further information regarding this rule by referring to FAC 2022-05, which precedes this document.

DATES:

March 7, 2022.

ADDRESSES:

The FAC, including the SECG, is available at https://www.regulations.gov.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Ms. Mahruba Uddowla, Procurement Analyst, at 703-605-2868 or by email at [e-mail], for clarification of content. For information pertaining to status or publication schedules, contact the Regulatory Secretariat Division at 202-501-4755 or [e-mail]. Please cite FAC 2022-05, FAR Case 2021-008.

Rule Listed in FAC 2022-05

Subject	FAR case
Amendments to the FAR Buy American Act—Requirements	2021-008

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

A summary for the FAR rule follows. For the actual revisions and/or amendments made by this FAR rule, refer to the specific subject set forth in the document following this summary. FAC 2022-05 amends the FAR as follows:

Amendments to the FAR Buy American Act Requirements (FAR Case 2021-008)

This final rule amends the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to implement section 8 of E.O. 14005, Ensuring the Future Is Made in All of America by All of America's Workers. Upon the October 25, 2022, effective date, this final FAR rule changes the domestic content threshold to 60 percent immediately, then to 65 percent for items delivered starting in calendar year 2024, and then to 75 percent for items delivered starting in calendar year 2029. While a supplier that is awarded a contract with a period of performance that spans this schedule of domestic content threshold increases will be required to comply with each increased threshold for the items in the year of delivery, this rule allows for the agency senior procurement executive to apply an alternate domestic content test under which the contractor would be required to comply with the domestic content threshold in place at time of award for the entire life of the contract.

This final rule also creates a fallback threshold that would allow for products and construction material meeting a 55 percent domestic content threshold to qualify as “domestic” under certain circumstances.

In addition, the final rule creates a framework for application of an enhanced price preference for a domestic product/domestic construction material that is considered a critical item or made up of critical components. The list of critical items and critical components, along with the associated enhanced price preference, will be incorporated in the FAR through separate rulemaking.

William F. Clark,

Director, Office of Government-wide Acquisition Policy, Office of Acquisition Policy, Office of Government-wide Policy.