On today’s prepublication page of the Federal Register, there are three proposed rules and one direct regulation listed that will remove 52 obsolete food regulations. They include:
- A proposal to revoke 18 Standards of Identity for Dairy Products (here);
- A proposal to revoke 23 Standards of Identity for Foods (here); and
- A revocation of Food Standards for 11 Products Not Currently Sold (here).
This appears to be one of the first moves to free up some space for new regulations in the face of the administration’s 10-for-1 rule where an Agency must revoke ten regulations for each new one it pursues. This batch of revocations and proposed rules will permit the FDA space to propose five new regulations.
I suspect that we’ll see an increase in revocations of rules that are outdated and no longer have relevance. But the question is, if the rules have no relevance (or, in the case of the revocations, apply to products that are no longer being marketed in the U.S.), does this really remove ACTUAL “red tape” or does it become a game of “hide the monkey,” just for appearances? One needs to consider this question these days.
