Slow Progress in Protecting U.S. Food Supply

Almost seven years ago, the Food and Drug Administration proposed a way to help prevent unsafe food imports from getting to U.S. consumers.

Food shipments rejected at a U.S. port for safety reasons would be marked "UNITED STATES REFUSED ENTRY" to discourage unscrupulous importers from trying to sneak them in through another U.S. port with fewer or less-suspicious inspectors. Congress added the FDA's so-called "port shopping" rule to the high-profile Bioterrorism Act enacted in 2002.

Despite broad support then — and renewed calls by Congress to tighten food import oversight — the marking law has yet to take hold. The FDA has yet to set specifications on such details as how big the mark should be and where it should go. Meanwhile, some importers still try to sneak in refused goods, says a recent Bush administration report on imported-food safety.

The fact that FDA-regulated refused foods aren't marked "is a failure of the FDA," says former FDA senior associate commissioner William Hubbard, who left the agency in 2005.

Read the full USA Today story here.