Food Laws Timeline

By Patrickun

  • USDA establishment date

    Department of Agriculture. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is a cabinet-level agency that oversees the American farming industry. USDA duties range from helping farmers with price support subsidies, to inspecting food to ensure the safety of the American public.

  • Meat Inspection Act

    The Federal Meat Inspection Act of 1906 (FMIA) is a United States Congress Act that works to prevent adulterated or misbranded meat and meat products from being sold as food and to ensure that meat and meat products are slaughtered and processed under sanitary conditions.

  • Pure Food and Drug Act

    Pure Food and Drug Act (1906) For preventing the manufacture, sale, or transportation of adulterated or misbranded or poisonous or deleterious foods, drugs, medicines, and liquors, and for regulating traffic therein, and for other purposes.

  • FDA establishment date

    FDA is responsible for protecting the public health by assuring the safety, efficacy and security of human and veterinary drugs, biological products, medical devices, our nation's food supply, cosmetics, and products that emit radiation.

  • Food and Drug Administration Act

    reauthorizes the Prescription Drug User Fee Act of 1992 and mandates the most wide-ranging reforms in agency practices since 1938. Provisions include measures to accelerate review of devices, regulate advertising of unapproved uses of approved drugs and devices, and regulate health claims for foods.

  • First Certified Color Regulations

    requested by manufacturers and users, list seven colors found suitable for use in foods.

  • Gould Amendment

    requires that food package contents be "plainly and conspicuously marked on the outside of the package in terms of weight, measure, or numerical count."

  • Mcnary-Mapes Amendment

    authorizes FDA standards of quality and fill-of-container for canned food, excluding meat and milk products.

  • Food Drug and Cosmentic Act

    Extending control to cosmetics and therapeutic devices.
    Requiring new drugs to be shown safe before marketing-starting a new system of drug regulation.
    Eliminating the Sherley Amendment requirement to prove intent to defraud in drug misbranding cases.
    Providing that safe tolerances be set for unavoidable poisonous substances.
    Authorizing standards of identity, quality, and fill-of-container for foods.
    Authorizing factory inspections.
    Adding the remedy of court injunctions to the previous penalti

  • Delaney Clause

    The Delaney Clause is a part of the 1958 Food Addi- tives Amendment (section 409) to the 1954 Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA). This clause governs regulation of pesticide residues in processed foods.

  • Fair Packaging and Labeling Act

    requires all consumer products in interstate commerce to be honestly and informatively labeled, with FDA enforcing provisions on foods, drugs, cosmetics, and medical devices.

  • FSIS establishment date

    The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), an agency of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), is the public health regulatory agency responsible for ensuring that that United States' commercial supply of meat, poultry, and egg products is safe, wholesome, and correctly labeled and packaged.

  • Saccharin Study and Labeling Act

    passed by Congress to stop FDA from banning the chemical sweetener but requiring a label warning that it has been found to cause cancer in laboratory animals.

  • Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act

    establishes specific labeling requirements, provides a regulatory framework, and authorizes FDA to promulgate good manufacturing practice regulations for dietary supplements. This act defines "dietary supplements" and "dietary ingredients" and classifies them as food. The act also establishes a commission to recommend how to regulate claims.