Court Imposes Food Safety Rulemaking Deadline on FDA

Finding the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) proposed “target time-frames” “an inadequate response to the request that the parties submit a proposal regarding deadlines that can form the basis of an injunction,” a federal court in California will require the agency to publish all proposed regulations required under the Food Safety Modernization Act by November 30, 2013. Ctr. for Food Safety v. Hamburg, No. 12-4529 (N.D. Cal., decided June 21, 2013). The court further ordered FDA to close each comment period no later than March 31, 2014, and to finalize the rules no later than June 30, 2015. The order follows the court’s determination that FDA violated the FSMA and Administrative Procedure Act by failing to comply with the food safety rulemaking deadlines established by Congress. Additional details about the litigation appear in issues 481 and 487 of this Update.