Industry Groups Oppose Food Safety Tax

Food Safety News (4/22, Bottemiller) reports the President’s “FY 2014 budget released earlier this month seeks a $295 million increase” for the Food and Drug Administration’s “food program, but the vast majority of the boost would come from new fees that Congress has not mandated, including $59 million in registration and inspection fees and $166 million in import fees, to help the agency roll out the Food Safety Modernization Act.”

Prior to a “hearing late last week, a coalition of industry groups sent a letter to Sens. Mark Pryor (D-AR) and Roy Blunt (R-MO), the chair and ranking member of the Senate appropriations subcommittee on agriculture and other agencies, urging the committee to ‘appropriately fund’ food safety at FDA ‘rather than support the imposition of any new food regulatory taxes.’”

At the hearing, when Pryor asked FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg about the issue, she said, “I do think it’s appropriate that our budget reflect that with a combination of budget authority commitment and user fees.”

Ricardo Gomez