The nation has experienced a spate of food contamination cases. They ranged from E.coli bacteria found in fresh leafy greens, including bagged salads, salmonella bacteria in peanut butter, pets sickened by the plastic melamine in their food and chickens and hogs withheld from market after they were fed some of the tainted pet food.
The FDA has blamed a lack of monitoring of growers and food producers who are expected to monitor voluntarily the food they produce. To fix the problem the FDA has asked for $76 million to beef up its monitoring of produce safety. It would also put stringent new rules on the growers and producers, a move FDA officials say would cut food contamination cases in half.
But lawmakers say that isn't enough because food safety is now overseen by 12 federal agencies, acting under the authority of 35 laws that govern food safety, often with overlapping jurisdictions and different priorities.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration play the biggest roles in ensuring the nation's food supply is safe, but that leads to problems of overlapping jurisdictions and conflicting priorities.
While the USDA oversees meat and poultry, the FDA is responsible for eggs and produce. That leaves the FDA responsible for cheese pizzas. However, pepperoni pizzas are under the jurisdiction of the Department of Agriculture.
The Food Safety Act of 2007 introduced by U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Connecticut would create a Food Safety Administration with oversight for all of the nation's food supply. DeLauro explained why doing something about protecting the nation's food supply was important now.
"I believe the food safety system is broken. It's collapsing," DeLauro told CNN "We're unable to protect the public health. We're unable to protect public confidence in the food supply."
