17 August 2004

FDA states contingency for systems failure involving prior notices

The following article is excerpted from the 17 August 2004 edition of “American Shipper”.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has developed its contingency plan for filing prior notices for food imports when the federal government's systems are down.

The plan covers outages in both the FDA's system and Customs and Border Protection's Automated Commercial System.

During a systems outage, filers may submit their prior notices to the FDA by e-mail and fax. The FDA said it does not plan to exempt any specific categories of food from the prior notice rules if systems are not working.

For more information, contact Domenic Veneziano of the FDA's Office of Regulatory Affairs at (703) 621-7809.