From January 2026, the FDA’s Food Safety Modernization Act’s (FSMA) Final Rule on Requirements for Additional Traceability Records for Certain Foods will enforce far tighter traceability standards for all US fresh food products and their overseas suppliers. The rule will also be applicable to all such producers and suppliers in Puerto Rico, Guam, US Virgin Islands, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands.
This means that relevant food and drink packaging companies, producers and suppliers will be legally obliged to enable highly enhanced tracking of their products across the entire supply chain of the US market and its territories.
The objective is to enable the rapid identification and removal of potentially contaminated products, which has represented a major challenge and health care cost across the United States in recent years.
According to the FDA, every year:
A staggering 48 million people, or one in every six US citizens, contract a foodborne illness
148,000 hospitalizations approximately
3,000 deaths as a consequence
Livestock and pets are also impacted by such contaminations.
The clock has started counting down to the new FSMA rule, with the adaptation period starting in November 2022.
Get ahead of the regulatory curve: Learn about the implications of preparing for the new FSMA rule and what it will mean in terms of traceability demands for US consumers and producers alike by downloading the interview with Markem-Imaje's US regulatory and traceability expert, David Habib.
David is a Senior Solutions Consultant for Packaging Intelligence software at MI, where he has worked for more than 17 years together with many leading major food and beverage producers. Before that, David worked for over 20 years in the supply chain and traceability markets for global companies helping them to develop systems to trace their products for recall and other regulatory purposes.
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