The Fisheries Council of Canada (FCC) and U.S.-based Better Seafood Bureau (BSB) are praising the Canadian Food Inspection Agency's (CFIA) letter to seafood importers urging them to comply with the country's labeling requirements.
The CFIA is stepping up its efforts to clamp down on short weighting and other forms of economic fraud common to the global seafood trade by increasing inspections and investigating complaints.
"We brought our continued concerns about net weight fraud to CFIA in January, as they worked on their Strengthened Fish Import Program," said FCC President Patrick McGuinness. "They quickly recognized the food-safety implications and incorporated, what we consider, a well-crafted plan to increase testing for net weight."
"We're pleased to see CFIA taking such a thorough and proactive approach on the net weight issue," said BSB secretary Lisa Weddig. "At the same time we're disappointed that our own Food and Drug Administration has failed to recognize the importance of this issue and devote needed resources to it.
"We appreciate the FDA's need for more resources, but with $650 million worth of food-safety funding in place we would hope they could find a way to allocate a few dollars to crack down on this fraudulent activity," she added.
April 1, 2009
