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Action plan, food protection plan now lead the pack

It was only a couple of months ago that an obscure provision about reporting dangerous food products, embedded in a big law that mostly dealt with toughening drug regulation, was the biggest change in food safety law in quite some time (see www.packworld.com/view-24168).

But recently, the Bush Administration surprised columnists everywhere by announcing a sweeping new batch of import safety measures in November. At the same time, FDA announced a β€œFood Protection Plan” as well. The reporting provisions from a couple months ago, which go into effect in about 10 months, would help induce recalls but still fell short of allowing FDA to explicitly order them. They are now old news, as everybody seems to be suggesting that FDA get new recall power explicitly and tougher penalties to impose, too.

In a rare and surprising display of speedy action, the administration announced a broad range of new steps on the same day a government working group announced recommended steps to enhance the safety of imported food and consumer products. They said, β€œWe suggest this,” and the White House said, β€œOK, we’ll do it!,” on more or less the same day.

A major focus was on imports, including food imports, which are a booming part of the U.S. food supply that still receives miniscule actual inspection at the border. Enhancing food safety has been a recognized need at least since September 2001, when the possibility of terror attacks on the food supply rose to the surface. The government would like people to think it is attacking this problem quickly, but in fact, it has been dragging its heels.

It probably was the recent rash of China-related issues that helped spur these new efforts, piling onto pre-existing inspirations.

For years there’s been a lot of hollering about how small a percentage of food imports are actually inspected before they are given the privilege of entering the U.S. The Administration’s new action plan says inspections on the way in only give a β€œsnapshot” of the food’s safety. Instead, through efforts to assure the products are of proper quality to begin with, U.S. officials will widen the lens through which quality is viewed.

They’ll do that first by figuring out which products present higher risks, then focusing efforts on those. FDA’s plan would give the agency the power to make producers of some foods from some countries certify that the products meet FDA’s standards, in exchange for speedier import. The names of the certified companies would be public, so other companies and consumers could check on them.

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