By Ricardo Carvajal – The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) directed the three federal agencies charged with ensuring the safety of biotechnology products (FDA, USDA, and EPA) to undertake a review intended to “improve the transparency, predictability, coordination, and, ultimately, efficiency of …
By Ricardo Carvajal – As directed under FSMA, FDA issued draft guidance on its approach to implementation of the Voluntary Qualified Importer Program (VQIP). In exchange for voluntarily subjecting themselves to an initial round of heightened scrutiny, importers who are approved for participation in the program …
By Ricardo Carvajal, Diane B. McColl & Jenifer R. Stach – FDA issued a declaratory order revoking the GRAS status of partially hydrogenated oils (PHOs), thereby finalizing its November 2013 tentative determination that there is no longer consensus among qualified experts that PHOs are safe for use in …
By Riëtte van Laack – Where’s the beef? It’s in a recent announcement from the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service (“FSIS”) concerning finalized labeling requirements for mechanically, blade- or needle-tenderized beef. Under the new rule, published on May 18, 2015, raw or partially cooked mechanically tenderized …
By Ricardo Carvajal - The AP reports that USDA has developed a Process Verified Program (PVP) claim for non-GMO corn and soybeans, at the request of “a leading global company.” The PVP claim was approved under a program operated by USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service. The program provides …
By Ricardo Carvajal & JP Ellison – Last week, the federal district court judge presiding over industry’s challenge to Vermont’s law requiring GMO labeling issued a complex decision arising out of dueling motions. The State of Vermont had asked the court to dismiss the plaintiffs’ complaint, …
By Riëtte van Laack – As we previously reported, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit issued a decision in what some have identified as a landmark advertising case of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) against POM Wonderful et al. (POM). On April 6, …
By Riëtte van Laack – On April 9, 2015, US Right to Know (USRTK, Petitioner) filed a Citizen Petition (CP) with FDA and sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requesting action against what USRTK claims is false and misleading use of the term …
By Riëtte van Laack – In an effort to stop the implementation of the National Organic Program’s (NOP’s) interpretation of the sunset review process, a coalition of organic “stakeholders” have filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for Northern California. The lawsuit alleges that the …
By Jay W. Cormier – It has been quite some time since the September 2010 Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee (“VMAC”) meeting that discussed FDA’s review of AquaBounty’s AquAdvantage Salmon application. Earlier this month, Food and Water Watch – a long-time and very vocal opponent to the …
By Riëtte van Laack – On April 9, 2015, FDA published a proposal to amend the regulations regarding registration of food facilities. The proposal addresses a multitude of issues: codification of certain self-implementing provisions of the Food Safety Modernization Act 0f 2011 (FSMA), amendment of the …
By Ricardo Carvajal & Diane B. McColl – FDA announced a “strategy to establish ingredient definitions and standards for animal food,” pursuant to a statutory directive in the Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (FDAAA). As indicated in one of our prior postings, this …
By Riëtte van Laack & Ricardo Carvajal - The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a district court’s dismissal of a lawsuit targeting certain allegedly false and misleading nutrient and health-related claims for Benecol, a vegetable oil-based spread. As noted in our prior posting on this case, the district …
By Ricardo Carvajal - That’s the question raised by a recently issued Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that takes FDA to task not just for lagging behind the foreign inspection targets established by FSMA, but also for not conducting “an analysis to determine whether the number of …
By Ricardo Carvajal – The question (in the title of this post) occurred to us in preparing for FDLI Food Week 2015, taking place as this is written. When FDA issued its Pathway to Global Product Safety and Quality in 2011, the agency set forth this ambitious objective: …
