The advocacy group Food & Water Watch is blasting the Obama administration over the delay in the creation of a program to conduct mandatory safety inspections of catfish. Over a year ago, Nov. 13, 2009, the UDSA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) submitted to the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) a draft proposed rule laying out the details of the program. The White House has yet to approve the proposal.

Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter issued a statement marking the one-year anniversary of the proposed rule’s submission:

The Obama administration has stated that it is interested in enhancing food safety for American consumers. So we cannot understand why it has not taken action on a food safety program established by Congress.

Currently, the Food and Drug Administration regulates catfish. Domestic catfish processors receive FDA inspections once every 5 to 10 years and only 2 percent of imported catfish gets inspected. The new inspection program would subject domestic catfish processors to daily USDA inspection and imported catfish – much of which is raised in insanitary conditions and is treated with antibiotics and other chemicals that have been deemed to be illegal in the U.S. – would receive more rigorous inspection by the USDA. 

Under the executive order that governs the regulatory review process, OIRA has 90 days to complete its review of agency draft rules. The deadline may be extended by 30 days, but only once. But, as the catfish example illustrates, OIRA can and does violate the order’s timetable.

It is difficult to determine what goes on during the review of agency draft rules. OIRA conducts its own review of agency drafts and circulates documents to other federal offices and agencies for their feedback. But the back-and-forth is usually hidden from public view, at least until after the rule is officially published.

For months, rumors have swirled that the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, another arm of the White House, is holding up the catfish rule. USTR is concerned about the rule’s impact on trade and potential costs to importers. “It seems clear that the Obama Administration is being pressured by importers and countries that export catfish not to implement the new regulations because they would not be able to meet stronger USDA standards,” Hauter said.

The 2008 Farm Bill requires that FSIS set up an inspection program. The law set a deadline of December 2009, but FSIS has yet to even propose the rule, let alone finalize it.

OIRA administrator Cass Sunstein has said that law should guide regulatory decisionmaking and that OIRA should promote compliance with the law. Given that, the White House needs to make clear to the public that it is assisting FSIS in meeting its legal obligations, not stymieing it.

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