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‘Exporters need US legal reps’
Vietnamese enterprises should have legal representatives in the US to liaison with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to ensure compliance with all requirements when exporting foodstuff, an official said at a conference last Saturday.
The FDA Registrar is ready to provide assistance and advice to Vietnamese businesses who expect to export foods to the U S, said David Lennarz, deputy chair of the FDA Registrar.
He told the conference, held to highlight opportunities and challenges for foodstuff exporters to the US market, that several Vietnamese exporters were inexperienced in dealing with the complicated regulations of the FDA.
One of the more common problems was labelling. David Lennarz said the FDA has very strict and detailed regulations on labels of products, including their location, the length of letters and the arrangement of the list.
For example, all labels of products exported to the US must be in English. Furthermore, the Vietnamese exporter should be well aware that substances contained in the products and presented on labels must be allowed to be used in the US.
The FDA has a list of generally recognised as safe (GRAS) substances. Any imports using any substance that is not part of the GRAS list will be confiscated and returned to the exporters. It also has health and nutrition requirements that the products have to adhere to, Lennarz said.
He noted that the US has also come up with more conditions on a product’s biological safety in a bid to prevent the entry of any toxins that could be used as chemical and biological weapons.
The FDA Registrar will help check and find out errors in labelling by Vietnamese exporters, so that the latter can make the necessary changes, said Lennarz, adding that his office also helps with exports of drugs, medical equipment and cosmetics.
This will hopefully reduce the risk of having exports returned for non-compliance with FDA regulations, Lennarz said.
VNS
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