The Food Safety Modernization Act now requires greater transparency from the entire supply chain and fundamentally changes the way food is regulated in the U.S. and abroad, from farm-to-fork. Additionally, the Food Supplier Verification Program (FSVP) shifts certain food safety responsibilities from the government to food companies. Now that companies shoulder much of the burden, proactive measures are essential.
National Cortina is a growing food importer and the go-to source for high quality food ingredients for over 50 years. Headquartered outside of New York City in New Jersey, they provide both imported and domestic ingredients to industrial, private label, and foodservice customers. After the rolling out and implementation of the FDA’s most sweeping reform to the food safety supply chain, known as the Food Safety and Modernization Act or FSMA for short, National Cortina was succumbed to abide by a new set of regulations that was set forth by FSMA.
Food adulteration is a serious threat to consumers, and its impact ranges from relatively harmless to fatal, depending on the severity of the infraction and who ends up consuming the adulterated food. But what exactly is food adulteration, and what is FSMA doing to help prevent it?
Food adulteration is a broad category of mishandled or misrepresented foods, so it helps to understand it by breaking it down into four main categories.
According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the average person in the U.S. consumes 1,996 pounds of food per year, and about one-fifth of that is imported. Since NAFTA’s inception, food imports have tripled. The 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act responds to rising foreign food imports by requiring that foreign suppliers meet the same standards that domestic suppliers do.
Accordingly, three final rules were published in the Federal Register on November 27, 2015, among them “Foreign Supplier Verification Programs (FSVP) for Importers of Food for Humans and Animals.”
As many as 15 million people in the United States have food allergies - and nearly half of those are children. It is no wonder that allergen regulations were part of FSMA. Facilities are now required to establish and implement food safety systems that include preventive controls, supply chain analysis and recall plans.
For further insight on what food companies should be doing to prevent allergen contamination, I spoke to Betsy Craig, a leading expert on food allergen labeling. She is an award winning CEO and the Founder of MenuTrinfo®, LLC, AllerTrain by MenuTrinfo, and Kitchens with Confidence.
