Did the U.S. Food and Drug Administration act illegally, capriciously and arbitrarily in its treatment of imported orange juice during the carbendazim incident?
This is the question that FDAImports.com Principal, Rick Quinn, and Associate Attorney, John Johnson, answer in their recent article published in the Food and Drug Law Institute’s Update magazine. The article, “Imported Orange Juice Gets the Squeeze: FDA’s Illegal Treatment of Brazilian Orange Juice During the Carbendazim Incident,” clearly outlines the history of the carbendazim issue, the FDA’s inconsistent response to both domestic and foreign juices, the EPA’s role in establishing tolerances and how the Food and Drug Administration showed preferential (and therefore illegal) treatment to domestic producers of orange juice.
“FDA was well-aware of possible allegations of treating similar situations differently,” Quinn and Johnson write. “When rejecting the Brazilian Citrus Exporters Association’s request for using finished product levels to determine the presence of carbendazim, it [FDA] stated ‘if our enforcement is not consistent, it would provide an unfair advantage’ to a firm that ensured the food offered for import complied the with Act. Got that? FDA can’t be inconsistent… except when it wants to be.” The article outlines how FDA made decisions that deliberately favored domestic orange juice even though the agency stated it would be unbiased in its handling of the issue.
Quinn and Johnson, along with the rest of the FDAImports.com team, were at the forefront of the carbendazim issue in early 2012, stating from the beginning that FDA’s response was reactionary, hasty and dealt improperly with a situation that posed no health risk to the American public. This article, published with the Food and Drug Law Institute, illustrates, from a legal and regulatory perspective, how FDA’s handling of the situation was both capricious and illegal. FDLI members may read the full article HERE.
About FDLI Update Magazine:
Published bi-monthly, Update magazine is free to all FDLI corporate and individual members. Update brings members the latest news from FDLI and the food and drug law community, featuring viewpoints on industry-specific trends, articles on varied topics of regulatory concern, changes at FDA, news about FDLI activities, and much more. – FDLI.org
