I truly wish I could say that pandemic news reports are waning. Unfortunately, there is no end in sight of seemingly daily developments. The delta variant of COVID-19 is now presenting new challenges for food retailers, restaurants and many other segments of the business community. The public seems to be rolling with the punches. An analysis from S&P Global Ratings predicted that the delta variant will have a modest impact on consumer spending, but we know that forecast could turn on a dime.
A new report from Meatingplace News recently said that companies will be ramping up e-commerce, home delivery, curbside pick-up, and other workarounds to offset softer brick-and-mortar sales should infection rates keep rising. Predictions were that consumers will continue to spend but in different categories and at more moderate levels as pent-up demand wanes. Shoppers are unlikely to give up their rediscovered out-of-home activities easily, the report stated, because of regional pockets of COVID-19 breakouts including the delta variant, that could limit capacity at retail or in restaurants.
E-commerce as a segment of U.S. retail sales climbed to 16 percent during the pandemic from about 11 percent pre-pandemic, according to S&P Global. If the delta variant case numbers accelerate rapidly, activities like dining out and travel could slow again, but e-commerce sales could also spike higher, the report said.
By the way, food retailers should expect to see the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) staff wearing masks again in retail facilities, regardless of vaccination status. FSIS said recently that the change to its mask requirement follows the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) new recommendations for fully vaccinated people in response to a national increase in COVID-19 cases. At presstime we are seeing more retailers returning to a mask-on policy and anticipate that more and more retail store employees may put their masks back on either voluntarily or by store policy. Customers are seen returning to a mask-on policy, too, in major markets.
E-commerce Marketers
With e-commerce growth predicted, those of you who are involved in that end of your business should be interested in an upcoming Food & Drug Administration (FDA) webinar. The FDA has announced that they will host a virtual summit October 19-21, 2021, to convene industry and consumer experts, government officials, stakeholders and other interested parties for a discussion and exchange of perspectives about the safety of human foods produced, manufactured, sold, and delivered directly to consumers through e-commerce. Participants will be discussing the regulatory framework that apply to these foods and ways to strengthen food safety. You can learn more at www.fda.gov/smarterfoodsafety.
Product Of USA Update
Last month in my column I informed readers about the Biden administration’s effort to clarify the “Product of USA” labeling issue. Not satisfied with policy directives from the Democratic president, a group of Senate Republicans has just introduced the USA Beef Act to address “Product of USA” labeling on foreign beef products.
According to a press release from the proposed legislation co-sponsor Mike Rounds (R-SD), the legislation would limit the use of “Product of USA” labels only to beef products from cattle born, raised, and slaughtered in the U.S. Currently, USDA rules allow beef raised in foreign countries to receive the label. “Consumers deserve to know where their beef comes from and accurate, transparent labeling supports American Farmers and ranchers,” Rounds stated. Along with Rounds, the bill’s co-sponsors include five other Republicans and one Democrat. A companion bill sponsored by Representative Matt Rosendale (R-MT) is being introduced in the House.
New Database Available
Your food safety and legal staff may be interested in this item from Food Safety News. The Milwaukee-based Food Industry Council, LLC has launched its “FIC Recall Reporter.” The new, free business tool is a searchable database of all FDA and USDA published Class I, Class II, and Class III food and beverage recalls since 2000.
The Food Industry Council says its “FIC Recall Reporter” is the ONLY single database in the world that contains this information. The database is updated regularly, allowing users to easily search the growing number of food recalls using a variety of user-friendly parameters. For example, within seconds, a user can learn whether a food product has been recalled, how many times it has been recalled, and how regulators classified those recalls, etc. Prior to “FIC Recall Reporter,” accessing this information required tedious and time-consuming multiple year-specific searches in separate FDA and USDA databases. To begin using the “FIC Recall Reporter,” go to www.foodindustrycounsel.com/recalls and check the preferred search criteria boxes on the left.
Food Stamps Benefits Revamp
By the first of October, a big increase will be on the way for Americans receiving Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. On August 16 USDA released a re-evaluation of the Thrifty Food Plan which is used to calculate SNAP benefits. As a result, the average SNAP benefit – excluding additional funds provided as part of pandemic relief – will increase for fiscal year 2022 beginning on October 1. The new cost for a typical family is $192.84 per week or $835.57 per month, which is 21.03 percent higher than the previous Thrifty Food Plan which I have discussed in some of my prior columns.
As directed by Congress in the 2018 Farm Bill, USDA has been reevaluating the Thrifty Food Plan, which is used to set benefit amounts for SNAP. The farm bill requires USDA to publish an updated plan by 2022 and every five years thereafter, but President Biden asked USDA to investigate it in an executive order issued in late January. Congress had already boosted the value of the benefit by 15 percent through September. However, the USDA understands the hardships that the pandemic has created for low-income families and many Hill watchers were predicting this latest move to increase SNAP benefits once again.
FSIS And FDA Sign New Pact
USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) and the FDA on July 28 signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to permit more efficient use of resources and contribute to improved public health protection.
The new MOU builds on existing efforts to increase interagency collaboration and coordination to achieve improved regulatory efficiency and effectiveness involving dual jurisdiction establishments that are regulated by both agencies. The MOU improves upon previous efforts by adding headquarters-level contacts for each agency to improve awareness of findings or emerging issues that may warrant more than local or regional coordination and updates the types of findings to be shared to reflect advances in understanding microbiological food hazards.
Climate Neutrality By 2040
Climate changes continues to be in the news a lot lately and the Biden administration has made it a focal point for change. Supporting the president’s mandate, the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) has announced that it is targeting 2040 for U.S. cattle production to be climate-neutral. A rancher-led process resulted in NCBA forming a sustainability goals task force earlier this year. In addition to committing to climate neutrality within 19 years, the task force’s goals include improving opportunities that result in a quantifiable increase in producer profitability and economic sustainability by 2025; enhancing trust in cattle producers as responsible stewards of their animals and resources by expanding educational opportunities in animal care; and continuous improvement of the industry’s workforce safety and well-being.
Food Labeling Modernization Act Is Back
In a repeat of 2013, 2015 and 2018, House member Frank Pallone (D-NJ) has yet again introduced the Food Labeling Modernization Act (FLMA). As in the past, there are a few new things of note, and a few other things have been removed (e.g., requirements for sesame allergen labeling, which was accomplished earlier this year).
The FDA Law Blog says that the latest version of the bill again directs FDA to establish a standard symbol system for front-of-package labeling for conventional foods. A food would be misbranded unless its principal display panel gears “summary nutritional information that reflects the overall nutritional value of the food or specified ingredients” as required in regulations that would be issued by FDA.
As noted in the previous iterations, the proposed 2021 FLMA focuses on nutrients. As FDA has recognized, modern nutrition science no longer focuses on nutrients, but instead focuses on certain foods and dietary patterns. Will this new version become law? It is a long shot, but one never knows as the road to getting the president’s signature is a very long one.
Barry Scher is associated with the public policy firm of Policy Solutions LLC and may be reached at [email protected].