Last Friday, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released a new set of regulations for both produced and imported foods, with an aim to combat food-borne illnesses.

Now the FDA with this new rule on hand can reinforce food safety by making ‘science-based standards’ for farm produce, including growing, harvesting, packing and holding and giving accountability to importers to make sure that the foods delivered by them meet the US food safety guidelines.

Michael R. Taylor, the agency's deputy commissioner for food and veterinary medicine, said that this was the first time ever that the food importers have come directly under FDA regulation.

The move is part of the 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act, and according to FDA it will prove helpful for both produce farmers and importers in preventing outbreaks of foodborne diseases such as the Salmonella cases in Mexican cucumbers and cyclospora infections in the Mexican cilantro.

The CDC's statistics has suggested that of the 322 million population in America an estimated 48 million have suffered from food-related illness, and of these nearly 128,000 were sent to the hospitals and 3,000 lost their lives.

The produce safety law will also be covering quality of water, health and hygiene of handlers/employees, compost and manure of wild and domesticated animals both, and equipment and buildings. It has been done as per the agency’s vision of a ‘comprehensive food safety overhaul’.

Taylor said the country relies 52% of its fresh fruit and 22% of its fresh vegetables from global supply, and with this the final foreign supplier verification rule is going to notably impact food retailers who import products into the United States.