FDA Announces 2012-2016 Food and Veterinary Medicine Strategic Plan
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently announced the availability of its draft Foods and Veterinary Medicine Strategic Plan 2012 – 2016, which takes into account “all of the activities within the jurisdictions of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition and the Center for Veterinary Medicine and includes activities supported by the Office of Regulatory Affairs.” According to the executive summary, the Foods and Veterinary Medicine (FVM) Program aims to protect the American food supply by securing high rates of compliance with science-based food safety and labeling standards as well as implementing “integrated, prevention-oriented and risk-based programs.”
To this end, the 2012-2016 plan identifies one cross-cutting goal—to “improve effectiveness and efficiency across all levels of the FVM program”—as well as seven program goals: (i) “Establish science-based preventive control standards across the farm-to-table continuum”; (ii) “Achieve high rates of compliance with preventive control standards domestically and internationally”; (iii) “Strengthen scientific leadership, capacity, and partnership to support public health and animal health decision making”; (vi) “Provide accurate and useful information so consumers can choose a healthier diet and reduce the risk of chronic disease and obesity”; (v) “Encourage food product reformulation and safe production of dietary supplements”; (vi) “Improve detection of and response to foodborne outbreaks and contamination incidents”; and (vii) “Advance animal drug safety and effectiveness.” FDA will accept comments on the draft strategic plan until November 1, 2011.
