General food safety, determination

Historically, the nutrition of animals can be divided into three general areas. Initial studies in animal nutrition focused on determination of essential nutrients. This effort was followed by investigations concerned with maximizing feed efficiency in livestock to obtain the greatest product yield with minimum feed inputs. Recently, efforts have focused on dietary supplementation of livestock to improve the quality of the product subsequently obtained from food-producing animals. The term quality is broad and as used here is meant to include aspects of improved shelf-stability, consumer acceptance and food safety. 

Foods or Food Additives (Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act) Reasonable certainty of no harm Food Additive Petition— Food and Drug Administration (FDA) must approve that the material is safe Generally Recognized as Safe— Notifier makes safety determination FDA reviews notification... 

This review focuses on the nonproteinaceous toxins elaborated by fungi (mycotoxins) and plants for two reasons Historically, mycotoxins and plant toxins have been important in food safety considerations, and, in general, proteinaceous toxins are not usually analyzed by thin-layer chromatography (TLC) procedures. With the exception of the paralytic shellfish poisons, TLC methods have been used seldom in the determination of seafood toxins. The TLC method for saxitoxin developed by Buckley et al. (1) has been used extensively in the analyses of the saxitoxins (2). Reference 3 is an excellent review of seafood toxins. 

Under all three processes, the submitter bears the burden of demonstrating that the intended use of the FCS is safe. In reviewing the submitter s determination of safety, FDA uses the reasonable certainty of no harm safety standard (codified in 21 CFR 170.3(i)). Thus, the data and information in all three processes are generally comparable for a given level of exposure and, internally, FDA s safety review and standard are equivalent for the three options. To date, the FDA has received and processed hundreds of TOR exemption requests and FCNs for food contact articles. 

---