FDA Issues Report on FY 2010 Food Imports, Facilities, and Foreign Offices
The Food and Drug Administration has submitted its first Annual Report on Food Facilities, Food Imports, and FDA Foreign Offices to Congress pursuant to the Food Safety Modernization Act.
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This is the first annual report required since FSMA’s January 2011 enactment, and provides baseline data for fiscal year 2010 prior to enactment of the law. Among other things, FDA's report provides the following data for FY 2010:
FDA Physically Examined 2.1% of All Food Imports in 2010
FDA states that it physically examined (conducted field exams or analyzed samples) 206,723 food import lines (shipments) in FY 2010. The total number of food import lines (shipments) for FY 2010 was 9,974,958. FDA physically examined 2.1 percent. (FDA notes that it screens all import lines electronically against a variety of risk criteria.)
FDA Had 13 Foreign Posts as of Jan 2011
FDA has established a total of 13 foreign posts1 as of January 2011. Of the 13 posts, 11 posts have been staffed with a total of 30 U.S. direct hires and 14 locally employed staff and are fully operational.
FDA Inspected 15% of Domestic Facilities, Less than 1% of Foreign Facilities
As of January 13, 2011, there were 167,033 active registered domestic facilities and 254,088 active registered foreign facilities, for a total of 421,121. In FY 2010, FDA and the States under contract with FDA inspected 25,214 domestic food facilities (15%) and 357 foreign food facilities (0.001%).
(FDA states that it is unable to provide FY 2010 information on the cost of inspecting facilities identified as high-risk or non high-risk under the framework established by FSMA. FDA is also unable to provide information on FY 2010 inspections of high-risk facilities or on the number of domestic and foreign facilities scheduled for inspection in FY 2010 which the Secretary did not inspect. Information will be provided in future annual reports as it becomes available.)
1Foreign offices were established in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, China; New Delhi and Mumbai, India; San Jose, Costa Rica; Santiago, Chile; Mexico City, Mexico; Brussels, Belgium; London, UK; and Parma, Italy.
(See ITT's Online Archives or 04/08/11 news, 11040822, for BP summary of a recent FDA update on implementation of the FSMA.
See ITT’s Online Archives or 01/04/11 news, 11010426, for a comprehensive BP summary of the FSMA, including the import provisions.
(Report dated 04/06/11)