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PETALING JAYA: Malaysian food exporters should be able to comply with the US Foreign Supplier Verification Program (FSVP) that will come into effect in the US in May, as the rule is not entirely new to them, said the Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers (FMM).
The rule, which will be enforced by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), requires the country’s food and beverage importers to conduct and document an evaluation of their foreign suppliers’ compliance status.
The importers are also responsible for conducting supplier verification activities and the corrective actions of any non-conformance of these activities.
“We were given to understand that the US FDA together with the Ministry of Health (MoH) had organised awareness workshops/seminars, targeting companies exporting to the US,” FMM told SunBiz in an email response.
“FMM was invited to the US FDA-MoH seminar on the US Food Safety Modernization Act on Sept 5, 2016, which we understand is part of the US FDA outreach programme in Malaysia,” it said, adding that quite a number of its member companies attended the seminar. Thus, FMM said, the affected local companies are already familiar with the requirements and should be able to meet those requirements.
FMM noted that the food manufacturers which already have a food safety management system in place, for example, the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) should be able to comply with the FDA requirement. “The industry is prepared to work with MoH to promote the HACCP certification system,” it said.
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