Apr 1, 2016
FDA submits transportation final rule for publication

The FDA has submitted the sanitary transportation final rule to the Federal Register for publication.

The goal of the final rule is “to prevent practices that create food safety risks, such as failure to properly refrigerate food, inadequate cleaning of vehicles between loads, and failure to properly protect food during transportation.”

The rule on the sanitary transportation of human and animal food would establish requirements for:

  • Vehicles and transportation equipment: The design and maintenance of vehicles and transportation equipment to ensure that it does not cause the food that it transports to become contaminated.
  • Transportation operations: The measures taken during transportation to ensure food is not contaminated, such as adequate temperature controls and separation of food from non-food items in the same load.
  • Information exchange: Procedures for exchange of information about prior cargos, cleaning of transportation equipment, and temperature control between the shipper, carrier, and receiver, as appropriate to the situation. For example, a carrier transporting bulk liquid non-dairy foods would want to ensure that vehicles that have previously hauled milk will not introduce allergens into non-dairy foods through cross contact.
  • Training: Training of carrier personnel in sanitary transportation practices and documentation of the training.
  • Records: Maintenance of written procedures and records by carriers and shippers related to transportation equipment cleaning, prior cargos, and temperature control.
  • Waivers: Procedures by which the FDA will waive any of these requirements if it determines that the waiver will not result in the transportation of food under conditions that would be unsafe for human or animal health and that it is in the public interest.

Documents submitted to the Federal Register can publish several days after they are submitted, with larger documents taking longer to process and display, the FDA said.

For more information, visit the FSMA Proposed Rule on Sanitary Transportation of Human and Animal Food web page.




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