The California Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA) has announced that “virtually all use of the pesticide chlorpyrifos in California will end” in 2020 “following an agreement between the Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) and pesticide manufacturers to withdraw their products.” The companies apparently agreed to end sales of chlorpyrifos by February 6, 2020, and growers will not be permitted to use or possess chlorpyrifos after December 31, 2020. Uses before that deadline “must comply with existing restrictions, including a ban on aerial spraying, quarter-mile buffer zones and limiting use to crop-pest combinations that lack alternatives.” “To ensure consistency for growers and for enforcement purposes, DPR is applying the terms and deadlines in the settlements to seven other companies that are not part of the settlement agreement but are subject to DPR’s cancellation orders,” CalEPA’s press release states.
Category Archives Legislation, Regulations and Standards
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has launched a public consultation on the risks associated with consuming aflatoxins, mycotoxins produced by two species of Aspergillus that “are known to be genotoxic (capable of damaging DNA) and carcinogenic.” Most human exposure to aflatoxins comes from contaminated grains and derived products, although they can also be found in milk, according to the notice. Comments will be accepted until November 15, 2019.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a number of developments in their work on organic food, poultry and food safety. FDA released an update on the implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), announcing it will track outcomes for FSMA rules for inspections and recalls via the Food Safety Dashboard. One metric the agency will track is how quickly a company issues a public notice for a Class 1 recall for human and animal food. FDA has also released guidance on recall plans for its multipart guidance on “how to comply with the requirements for hazard analysis and risk-based preventive controls under our rule entitled ‘Current Good Manufacturing Practice, Hazard Analysis, and Risk-Based Preventive Controls for Human Food.’” USDA updated the National Poultry Improvement Plan (NPIP) Program Standards to incorporate proposed changes published in April 2019, including the amendment of the testing…
The U.S. House of Representatives has passed the SAFE Banking Act, which allows financial-service firms to work with "cannabis-related legitimate businesses and service providers," providing protection from federal prosecution for banks in states that have legalized cannabis. The bill, introduced by Rep. Ed Perlmutter (D-Colo.), has been sent to the Senate. In its press release praising the bill's passage, the National Cannabis Industry Association introduced a plan calling for "cannabis products, like other highly regulated consumables, to be regulated by the government agencies that currently regulate most food and drugs, primarily the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) within the U.S. Department of the Treasury." Under the plan, "cannabis products would be divided into four categories, based on chemical components, safety, intended use, and consumption method. Each of these groups would be regulated through a separate regulatory 'lane' tailored to the…
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has released guidance on the use of "medically important antimicrobials" in "food-producing animals." The guidance describes a voluntary process that "will help ensure new animal drugs containing antimicrobials of human importance are administered only under veterinary oversight and only for therapeutic uses." The agency will accept comments on the guidance until December 24, 2019.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Health Organization (WHO) have released a report on Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC) and the foods that tend to host it. Researchers analyzed data from foodborne outbreak investigations globally, finding 957 outbreaks in 27 countries. The data identified that 16% of outbreaks were attributed to beef, 15% to produce and 6% to dairy, while the sources for 57% of the outbreaks could not be identified. "Prioritizing interventions for control on beef supply chains may provide the largest return on investment when implementing strategies for STEC control," the report recommended.
A group of U.S. lawmakers, led by Reps. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) and James Comer (R-Ky.), have urged the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to "quickly adopt a policy of enforcement discretion and to consider issuing an interim final rule to regulate [cannabidiol (CBD)] as a dietary supplement and food additive while simultaneously moving forward with a robust framework for evaluating the safety and accurate labeling of these products." The letter stated that the agency's "current regulatory posture on CBD has created significant regulatory and legal uncertainty for participants in this quickly evolving industry. We are discouraged by FDA's estimation that a rulemaking process could span 3 to 5 years. We believe there are more expeditious measures that FDA could take that would establish regulatory clarity while pursuing enforcement actions against bad actors." In the U.S. Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) reportedly took a different path in an effort to…
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) has announced a "final rule to modernize swine slaughter inspection and bring it into the 21st century." The rule "amends the regulations to require all swine slaughter establishments to develop written sanitary dressing plans and implement microbial sampling to monitor process control for enteric pathogens that can cause foodborne illness" and "allows market hog establishments to choose if they will operate under [the New Swine Slaughter Inspection System] or continue to operate under traditional inspection." In April 2019, The Washington Post compared the proposed rule to the relationship between aircraft manufacturers and the Federal Aviation Administration, and FSIS responded with a press release stating, "Shame on you, Washington Post. This story earns you at least four Pinocchios."
The National Advertising Division (NAD) has recommended that Clemens Food Group and its flagship brand, Hatfield Quality Meats, "discontinue the claim 'Ethically Raised by Family Farmers Committed to a Higher Standard of Care, Governed by Third Party Animal Welfare Audits.'" NAD acknowledged that the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) reviewed the claim, but the "record here did not demonstrate that FSIS considered consumer impact or that it explained its reasoning with respect to its determination on the 'ethically raised' claim. Accordingly, NAD undertook its own review of the challenged claims." The challenger, Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), argued that the claim misled "a high percentage" of consumers "because they took the claim to mean that the animals’ treatment and living conditions exceed industry standards." NAD noted that AWI provided a consumer perception survey, and the board found the survey to be methodologically sound. Hatfield submitted "caretaker standards, third-party auditing and…
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced "A New Era of Smarter Food Safety," a public meeting "to get input from a broad cross-section of stakeholders on a modern approach the Agency is taking to strengthen its protection of the food supply." The meeting, which will be held October 21, 2019, is intended to "foster a dialogue with our domestic and international regulatory and public health partners, industry, consumers, academia, and others," and input will "be used to shape an FDA Blueprint for a New Era of Smarter Food Safety."
