To increase transparency, assist food and drug stakeholders, including those in the retail sector, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has just announced its regulatory agenda and posted a new website listing all regulations it plans to publish by October 2024. The FDA has also announced longer-term regulations it is prioritizing for later publication. Finally, the FDA has also updated a list of guidance topics that the agency is considering and expects to publish by the end of this year.
The following five topics have been added to the list of guidance documents the FDA expects to publish by the end of December 2024: (1) infant formula – draft guidance for the food industry; (2) lead in food; (3) the Food Traceability Rule – draft guidance for the food industry; (4) hazard analysis and risk-based preventive controls for human food; and (5) voluntary sodium reduction goals for foods.
Why is all this so important? Guidance documents represent the FDA’s current thinking on a specific topic, and the information can help retailers plan for potential changes that may impact their businesses. Public comments on the list of guidance topics can be submitted to www.regulations.gov using Docket ID FDA-2022-D-2088.
New Caucus Formed On The Hill
Nutra Ingredients USA News has reported that after sitting idle for a few years, a bipartisan group of Hill lawmakers is bringing the Congressional Dietary Supplement Caucus back to life. Caucus co-chairs Representative John Curtis (R-UT) and Tony Cardenas (D-CA) led the request for formal registration and recognition as a Congressional Member Organization. Thirty members of Congress will comprise the caucus, which will serve as a conduit for the exchange of ideas and information about dietary supplements. The goal of the new caucus is to conduct educational briefings to inform members of Congress and their staffs about the changing legislative and regulatory landscape facing the dietary supplement industry.
Stopping Cybersecurity Breaches
Senators Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Tom Cotton (R-AR) have introduced a bill in the Senate aiming to strengthen cybersecurity for the agriculture and food sectors. A companion bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives. The official name of the bill is the Farm and Food Cybersecurity Act, and it will identify vulnerabilities and improve protective measures of both the federal government and the private sector against cyber threats.
Specifically, the legislation would direct the U.S. secretary of agriculture, in coordination with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, to conduct a study every two years of the cybersecurity threats to agriculture and food sectors and submit a report to Congress. Then, if necessary, additional laws, rules, and regulations would be enacted to eliminate any potential cybersecurity threats.
White House Tells Grocers To Cut Prices
Reuters and other print and electronic news media across the country ran stories last month reiterating the Biden administration’s call for grocery chains to lower prices on goods as costs ease. “Our message is a very clear one that the president has and will continue to lean into, which is, if you’re a company whose input prices have come down and you’re not passing those savings along to the consumer, he will call you out,” said Jared Bernstein, the chair of Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, in a virtual meeting held with the news media last month. “There are still too many corporations in America ripping people off: price gouging, junk fees, greedflation, (and) shrinkflation,” said President Biden.
It is election time folks and fodder like the president is telling the news media and the public makes for difficult times for grocers. The president’s staff are discussing ways the president can turn up the heat on large food chains in the weeks and month to come. This is a good time to get your public relations team prepared to address pricing issues in anticipation of news media calls.
Retail Food Protection Center
The FDA has announced the release of the “Listing of Retail Food Protection Information and Resources” webpage to provide stakeholders with a user-friendly format for accessing information and resources about FDA policies and regulations. The new webpage categorizes FDA’s most popular retail food safety information in a table format sortable by topic, title, type of document, etc. For additional information, go to www.fda.gov/retailfoodprotection.
Streamline Workplace Standards
An item crossed my desk from the Berman Company that I want to share with you. Last year, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) reversed a Trump-era standard that made it easier for employers to fire employees for making fascist or sexist comments during union activity. Now, employers are pushing back against the decision, saying that ignoring discriminatory verbal attacks by employees violates nondiscrimination laws enacted by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). They argue the NLRB’s ruling limits their discretion and forces them to choose whether to follow EEOC laws or NLRB rules. Business groups and Congresspeople alike have called on the government to rein in the agency and streamline workplace standards, according to the Berman report.
What FMI Says About Traceability
Food Marketing Institute (FMI) says, and rightly so, that the FDA Food Traceability Final Rule is one of the most complex regulations under the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act. Published in late 2022, the final rule covers the entire food supply chain, and it requires persons who manufacture, process, or pack food products to maintain strict records which will result in faster identification and rapid removal of potentially contaminated food from the marketplace, resulting in fewer foodborne illnesses and/or deaths.
FMI has said that “the food industry is now faced with many challenges – the final rule is complex, the scope of the Food Traceability List is vast and broad, and the regulatory requirements conflict with operational practices. Regardless, the food industry must navigate the challenging landscape and meet the requirements of the rule by the January 20, 2026 compliance date.” If you have questions about the traceability rule, FMI, as well as the National Grocers Association (NGA), stand ready to assist you. Both organizations have worked tirelessly on this issue along with federal regulators and are ready to help their members comply. January 20, 2026 may seem like a long way off but falling into compliance is not something you can do in a matter of weeks or months prior to 2026.
Farm Bill Stuck In Limbo
As usual, partisan politics continues to stand in the way of moving the all-important-to-our-food-industry Farm Bill forward. However, if you read my commentary in the past you know by now this is SOP (standard operating procedure) for farm bills. The crosshairs issue is still funding critical benefit relief programs for the poor, especially within the SNAP and WIC programs. House members on the Democratic side are resisting Republican efforts to redirect funds from the Inflation Reduction Act towards conservation and commodity programs while Senate Dems are facing similar pushback for proposing new crop insurance plans. So, while members of Congress did pass a one-year extension of the Farm Bill, we continue to look to the end of this year for passage of a new, five-year Farm Bill.
Alt Products – The Future
I’ve reported recently in my prior commentary that a few states, the latest now including Virginia, have proposed legislation effectively banning plant-based alt products from grocer’s shelves. Even Turkey and Italy have joined the “ban the fake stuff” movement. There is also, as I previously reported, a movement on Capitol Hill to enact new legislation which would clearly define new labeling requirements for all alt products. And to add fuel to the fire, while some plant-based meat sales have slumped in a few U.S. markets, plant-based sales have boomed in other regions in the U.S. with projections that alt-product sales will double by 2030. Thus, consumers overall are still slowly showing renewed interest in plant-based meat, seafood, chicken, and even dairy products (i.e. – soy and coconut milk, etc.) with health concerns being a major driver behind purchasing decisions. Who really knows where alt products are going in the future?
Karsten Schellhas is a meat and alt-protein product consultant with 30+ years of experience in meat processing and alt-protein product development. He says that scientists are currently working hard to create new alt products that have never been made before, so let’s prepare for the inevitable. “Only collaboration will move this new food economy forward to serve the planet and its people in the 21st century and beyond,” he says. We at Policy Solutions think alt-products deserve their due process and that the regulation and labeling of alt-products should be a federal issue and not addressed on a state-by-state basis which will only cause confusion in the marketplace.
An Interesting News Tidbit
Paper and oil may be an unlikely match for a product container, but margarine manufacturer ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter’ has announced the beginning of its transition to paper-based packaging from plastic. The new packaging is the world’s first plastic-free, recyclable tub for plant butters and spreads. It took four years of R&D and hundreds of prototypes to find a solution for the new packaging, which is durable, leak-proof, food-safe and looks attractive. The new packaging is also recyclable in local paper waste streams and should be rolled out at the end of this year. Will the innovative new packaging spark innovation amongst other spread brands? Hopefully yes. Removing plastic from the environment and landfills is the goal. When you see the new packaging, remember you read about it first here!