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Send to KindleTense trends tend to send messages to packaging makers
The company was asked to provide copies of all its “policies and procedures” that help assure its foods don’t pose a risk to human health or are exposed to chemicals that might be dangerous, “or about which the company does not possess adequate information to assess whether the chemicals may be hazardous to human health,” along with the company’s assessments of the health risks from this particular chemical. Is this a trend that reflects a reduction in attention and care regarding packaging quality control? I answer bravely: I don’t know.
Regardless of the cause, there are at least 3 reasons why corporate executives at food and packaging makers should be paying close attention, if they are not already doing so, to their packaging materials’ compliance, including confirming their compliance with food contact or drug packaging requirements in the first instance, and then on an ongoing basis.
One is, we are very likely to see a new food safety law finalized before year end, and it is expected to contain mandatory FDA recall power and a requirement that food makers impose a hazard analysis-type control program a la HACCP, now required for seafood, juices, meat and poultry, and infant formula. Even those who don’t make food but just make food packaging already have felt the pressure for some years to have such HACCP plans in place, as food makers increasingly want every one of their foods’ components, including its packaging, to be made in accordance with a controlled system. As noted in Packaging World, April 2010, the Institute of Packaging Professionals’ Food Safety Alliance for Packaging has already published model HACCP plans for makers of six different types of packaging. [Editor’s note: The author is a Board member of FSAP and General Counsel to IoPP.]
Second, there have been rumblings indicating that, as part of FDA’s new, tougher enforcement approach, it will resurrect use of criminal prosecutions of corporate officials when violative products are put on the market, even when the officials had no intention of violating the law.
Finally, a third good reason to pay close attention to these issues is that they are being attacked from two different government angles, because such issues are viewed as chemical safety controversies at least as much as food contact material compliance issues. The Congressional inquiry into the Kellogg’s matter echoes complaints of the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency over the past year or so, which has led it to tighten up its oversight of some chemicals.
So, because it appears that food packaging as such is going to be a more prominent player on the regulatory scene, packagers are especially well advised right now to make compliance a priority.
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