FSIS Food Safety Education Podcasts Available via iTunes
FSIS recently launched a series of educational podcasts to address food safety and education issues for consumers and other stakeholders. Subscribers will receive the latest additions through an RSS feed or Web feed collector, with news and information about agency work to ensure public health protection through food safety.
FSIS podcasts are short, factual audio and video files featuring scientists, policy experts and other specialists that can be downloaded to MP3 players.
Users can listen to podcasts directly from the FSIS web site at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/News_&_Events/podcasts/index.asp or via subscription from the iTunes store.
‘Guidance for Industry: A Food Labeling Guide’ Now Revised
The Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition of the FDA has published “Guidance for Industry: A Food Labeling Guide.” The guidance, which replaces the previous version issued in 1994, contains nonbinding recommendations regarding food labeling. It addresses the most frequently raised questions and is a summary of the required statements that must appear on food labels. To help minimize legal action and delays, FDA recommends that manufacturers and importers become fully informed about applicable laws and regulations before offering foods for distribution in the U.S.
The food labeling guide is available at http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~dms/2lg-toc.html.
Modified Guidelines Allow for Continued Potato Trade Between the United States and Canada
In May, USDA and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) announced modified guidelines to allow for the continued trade of potatoes should there be future detections of potato cyst nematodes in either the U.S. or Canada.
As part of the revised export certification requirements, all fields used to produce seed potatoes for trade between Canada and the U.S. must be soil sampled using a full field grid pattern. As a result, the previous sampling technique (the perimeter sampling approach) no longer meets the agreed-upon requirements. All potato shipments between the two countries also must include a phytosanitary certificate with an additional declaration confirming that the seed potatoes originated from fields tested and were found free of potato cyst nematodes.
The golden nematode and the potato cyst nematode are internationally recognized as quarantine plant pests, but they do not threaten human health. If left uncontrolled, these pests have the potential to cause significant damage to potato crops.