Industry Urges Congress To Adopt Enhanced Food Safety Reforms
As we continue to comment on food safety litigation avoidance and crisis management, several food industry groups on Friday, in letters to Congress, urged House and Senate leaders to quickly enact enhanced food safety reforms. The letters announced that, although “Americans continue to enjoy the safest food supplies in the world, . . . new challenges require Congress and the Administration to modernize our food safety net.” In turn, industry groups urged lawmakers to move forward on the following FDA proposals, originally announced in 2007, as part of the FDA’s Food Protection Plan:
- Require Domestic Food Safety Plans: As proposed, the initiatives would require domestic food producers to affirmatively identify potential food safety risks associated with production methods and products, identify and implement enhanced production or other controls, and prepare formalized food safety plans (for FDA review) addressing such risks;
- Require Foreign Food Safety Plans: Adoption of the pending initiatives would also empower the FDA to assist foreign governments seeking to adopt robust food safety regulations, and require foreign food product importers to better police foreign suppliers. The initiatives would also, in part, require domestic foreign food product importers to document food safety controls being implemented by foreign suppliers, and require such records to be available for FDA review; and
- Adopt A More Robust Risk-based Approach to Inspections: As proposed, the initiatives would also enable the FDA to increase food safety inspections for those facilities and products (both foreign and domestic) that pose, based upon science and risk-based studies, the greatest risk of potential contamination.
In addition to encouraging a more robust food safety inspection system for domestic and foreign products, the letters also urged Congress to better enhance the safety of fruits and vegetables by establishing uniform standards for high-risk products. In addition, the letters addressed the FDA’s continuing request for mandatory recall authority, which would be available to the agency in those rare circumstances where companies refused, following FDA recommendations, to initiate recalls voluntarily.
The letters were undersigned by numerous industry organizations, including the Grocery Manufacturers Association, the Food Marketing Institute, the American Frozen Food Institute, the International Bottled Water Association, the International Dairy Foods Association, the National Fisheries Institute, the National Restaurant Association, the Retail Industry Leaders Association, the Snack Food Association and the United Fresh Produce Association. According to Pamela Bailey, President and CEO of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, improved food safety tools would ultimately enable us to better “maintain our position of global leadership and assure consumer confidence.”
