The first foreign audit reports of 2023 are good for Japanese and Israeli meat exporters to the US

The USDA’s Foreign Audit Reports for Japan and Israel have been released during the past week. Japan’s food safety systems for raw intact beef products were the subject of fieldwork from July 19 to August 17, 2022. Israel’s food safety systems were evaluated from June 27 to July 19, 2022, for processed poultry products. The final reports were released to the Japanese government on Jan. 3, 2023, and to the Israeli government on Jan. 5, 2023. The USDA’s foreign audits are conducted by the Food Safety and Inspection Service’s (FSIS) Office of International Coordination. In conducting foreign audits, the FSIS focuses on six system equivalence components: (1) Government Oversight (e.g., Organization and Administration); (2) Government Statutory Authority and Food Safety and Other Consumer Protection Regulations (e.g., Inspection System Operation, and Product Standards and Labeling); (3) Government Sanitation; (4) Government Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) System; (5) ...