Building An Integrated Food Safety System Is An Enormous Challenge
By Isaac Fletcher, contributing writer, Food Online
The FDA has stressed that an integrated food safety system is a critical element in taking a preventive approach to food safety. However, building an integrated system presents some unique and very big challenges.
An important part of the FDA’s implementation of FSMA is building an integrated food safety system. An integrated food safety system is a critical part of reducing the risk of illness attributed to food from facilities that are subject to preventive controls under FSMA legislation.
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When it comes to FSMA implementation, the act stipulates that the FDA must coordinate with and/or consult with state health and agriculture departments regarding any actions that are necessary to fulfill FSMA implementation. The FDA is also to support these agencies when it comes to food safety activities and upgrading services that they perform. Although FSMA respects federal and state responsibilities, many of the act’s goals are more readily achieved when synergies between state and federal entities are leveraged in an integrated way.
The FDA states that in order to address FSMA requirements, an integrated food safety system will be built and has identified the Partnership for Food Protection (PFP) as the group that will help build this system. The FDA’s website states, “The Partnership for Food Protection (PFP) is a group of dedicated professionals from federal, state, and local governments (partner agencies) with roles in protecting the food supply and public health.” In terms of building an integrated system, “PFP is the structure used to meld and coordinate representatives with expertise in food, feed, epidemiology, laboratory, animal health, environment, and public health to develop and implement an Integrated Food Safety System (IFSS).”
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Even with ongoing effort and the existence the PFP, there are still some hurdles to overcome on the path to an integrated food safety system. One of those hurdles is the fact that the preventive efforts of each agency must be sustainable. In particular, due to limited resources, there are some concerns regarding how heavily FSMA relies on state-level inspections. With the entirety of the FSMA budget being funded by Congress, some FDA executives have expressed concerns about the ability to achieve — and sustain — all of the act’s objectives. Furthermore, implementation and integration may be slowed by the need to train, communicate, and collaborate among a large number of federal and state entities.
Funding remains a key concern, and in the absence of a sustainable budget, many state agencies may soon be exploring grant and contract funding solutions.