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the listing process itself was changed in important ways. The Secretary must give notice and hold hearings in or near the critical habitats of proposed listings, and at the time of the proposal the Secretary must specify those activities that, in his opinion, would adversely affect the habitat and on that account would face prohibition after the listing and habitat designation. The net effect of the new listing requirements will probably be to reduce significantly the rate at which new species are added to the list, at least for US species. Indeed, everyone of the changes mentioned above works in this direction. It is impossible to say just how much the rate will fall, but an upper limit is the rate of critical habitat designations. If the economic impact and local participation requirements play an important role, the actual rate may be considerably less than it was in the past. (In the past 2-1/2 years, critical habitats have been designated for 34 species.) One can make a good argument that these changes will have little or no impact on the implementation of the Act to halt or modify development projects. After all, nearly 200 species are already on the list. Besides, species that \J' are not on the list may be proposed for inclusion in relatively short order. J\\0"~~ Though a biological assessment is required only in those areas where listed or ,~>~ proposed species are suspected to be present, a routine EIS may turn up speci- l,\ mens of a previously unsuspected species--as indeed happened with the Furbish lousewort. Although it is true that the listing process will be more arduous in the future, the FWS would naturally tend to commit its resources to the species that face the most danger--those species about to be "developed" into oblivion. But there are other considerations that, on balance, appear to outweigh these. First, it should be noted that although 200 US species have been listed, only 34 critical habitats have been designated. The economic impact requirement will make critical habitat designation and new species listing much more visible and allow for more local input, and the FWS is likely to find that in this environment it can no longer afford to be so risk-averse in endangered species protection. Second, the 2-year limit from proposal to final promulgation means that the FWS will have to be much more careful about the species it proposes. (At the time of enactment of the 1978 Amendments, about 1800 species were proposed for listing; these proposals are now being rescinded.) Experience with other agencies suggests that informal rulemaking 21