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Earlier this spring, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued additional guidance for agencies on implementing Executive Order (EO) 13771, entitled “Reducing Regulation and Controlling Regulatory Costs.”  EO 13771 established the expectation that for every new regulatory action an agency issues, it must offset the cost of the regulatory action with two…

The Trump Administration recently released its Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 budget request. The FY 2018 budget request is notable because it proposes dramatic cuts to both the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), among other agencies. Presidential budget proposals are at most a starting point – with Congress ultimately…

Following the release of the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) nutrition labeling revisions in May 2016, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) is proposing to amend the nutrition labeling requirements for meat and poultry products. The proposed revisions parallel almost exactly FDA’s final nutrition labeling revisions.  Comments are due 60…

Consumers will have greater access to Omega fatty acid content on meat, poultry, and egg product labels based on new guidance issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). Under these guidelines, FSIS will permit on labels factual statements identifying the amount of Omega fatty acids per serving, although qualifiers…

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) released its final pathogen reduction performance standards for Salmonella and Campylobacter in raw chicken parts and not-ready-to-eat (NRTE) comminuted chicken and turkey products, entitled New Performance Standards for Salmonella and Campylobacter in Not-Ready-to-Eat Comminuted Chicken and Turkey Products and Raw Chicken Parts and…

On December 1st, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) issued a final rule making slight changes to an earlier interim final rule to protect against highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI). The interim final rule prohibited or restricted importing living birds and poultry (including hatch eggs) and bird and…

The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) will soon publish in the Federal Register its long anticipated final rule modernizing the poultry slaughter inspection system. The final rule generally tracks the Agency’s January 2012 proposal with some modifications, most notably a lower line speed than proposed for chicken establishments. The new system, dubbed the New…

Yesterday, the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) released a compliance guideline addressing steps meat and poultry establishments can take to control and prevent the introduction of undeclared allergens into food products. The guidance, Allergens and Ingredients of Public Health Concern: Identification, Prevention and Control, and Declaration through Labeling (the Guidelines), identifies key steps FSIS…

On December 6, the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) published a notice in the Federal Register that will effect several changes to the way the agency regulates not-ready-to-eat (NRTE) ground and other comminuted poultry products. Establishments producing NRTE comminuted poultry products must reassess their HACCP plans within 90 days of the notice’s publication to…