FDA Food Safety Modernization Act Program

The FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) is a law in the United States that aims to modernize the food safety system and improve the safety of the food supply. The FSMA was signed into law in 2011, and is administered by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) is one of the most comprehensive reforms of food security for over 70 years. On this occasion, the United States Accreditation Inc. is recognized by the FDA as an accreditation body.

What does FSMA (FDA Food Safety Modernization Act Program) cover?

The FSMA is designed to address the growing challenges of food safety in the 21st century, including emerging foodborne pathogens, the increasing complexity of the food supply chain, and the globalization of the food industry. The FSMA requires the FDA to implement a number of new regulations and programs to improve the safety of the food supply, including:

There are five major elements included in the Food Safety Modernization Act:

• Preventive controls - For the first time, FDA has a legislative mandate to require comprehensive, prevention-based controls across the food supply to prevent or significantly minimize the likelihood of problems occurring.
• Inspection and Compliance - The legislation recognizes that inspection is an important means of holding industry accountable for its responsibility to produce safe food. FDA is committed to applying its inspection resources in a risk-based manner and adopting innovative inspection approaches.
• Imported Food Safety - FDA has new tools to ensure that imported foods meet U.S. standards and are safe for our consumers. For example, for the first time, importers must verify that their foreign suppliers have adequate preventive controls in place to ensure safety, and FDA will be able to accredit qualified third party auditors to certify that foreign food facilities are complying with U.S. food safety standards.
• Response - For the first time, FDA has mandatory recall authority for all food products. FDA expects that it will only need to invoke this authority infrequently since the food industry largely honors our requests for voluntary recalls. The agency has other new authorities that are also in effect: expanded administrative detention of products that are potentially in violation of the law, and suspension of a food facilitys registration.
• Enhanced Partnerships - The legislation recognizes the importance of strengthening existing collaboration among all food safety agencies U.S. federal, state, local, territorial, tribal and foreign--to achieve our public health goals. For example, it directs FDA to improve training of state, local, territorial and tribal food safety officials.

Soon, According to the approval received by the FDA, the United States Accreditation, INC. will authorized to accredit third-party certification bodies, also known as third-party auditors.

Soon, the United States Accreditation Inc. is recognized by the US FDA to accredit certification bodies capable of conducting food safety inspections such as:

• Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) Systems (Juice HACCP)
• Fish and Fishery Products (Seafood HACCP)
• Thermally Processed Low-Acid Foods Packaged in Hermetically
• Sealed Containers (LACF)
• Acidified Foods

Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) empowers FDA to take proactive steps to prevent the sale, distribution, and consumption of tainted food products by recognizing accreditation bodies like U.S. Accreditation, INC. to assess the competence of food safety inspection organizations according to the international standard, ISO/IEC 17065. The goal is to create a food safety system that focuses upon preventing contamination rather than reacting to problems that have already occurred.