FDA rejects notion of food oversight consolidation
David Acheson says no to the idea of creating a new agency or consolidating operations at USDA
No dice. So said the FDA’s assistant commissioner David Acheson this week, rejecting suggestions by some food safety advocates that a new single agency oversee the American food supply — or, in the alternative, that the responsibilities be consolidated in a single existing agency. Acheson’s objection, of course, was that the suggestion suggested that the consolidation end up in the hands of the USDA, even though presently the FDA regulates 80 percent of the food supply through its oversight of fruits and vegetables. “Clearly, we need to make some changes,” said Acheson. But “simply moving boxes around doesn’t solve a problem.” Fortunately for him, outside of a few Democratic congressmen nobody else seems to like the idea. The USDA is unenthusiastic despite the prospect of bureacratic expansion, and the activist group Center for Science in the Public Interest said “USDA cannot be trusted to take on the huge responsibility of managing the entire food safety system,” Reuters reported.
