Food Control - Import notifications (2022)
In the United States of America, in 2022, there were recorded 787 import notifications of fisheries and aquaculture products through the Import Refusal Report (IRR) system of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The cause of notifications was organized into four categories, including: chemical, histamine, microbiological and a broad category called “other causes”. As summarized in the table below, most import notifications were due to the “others” category (428 cases), followed by microbiological issues (243 cases). The third largest cause of notifications was due to chemicals with 93 cases, followed by the presence of histamine above the maximum levels with 23 cases. It is important to note that import notifications decreased from 1 012 in 2021 to 787 in 2022.
| Month | Others | Microbiological | Chemical | Histamine | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 17 | 8 | 7 | 1 | 33 |
| February | 14 | 15 | 20 | 0 | 49 |
| March | 23 | 17 | 8 | 0 | 48 |
| April | 51 | 37 | 10 | 0 | 98 |
| May | 48 | 14 | 9 | 1 | 72 |
| June | 35 | 27 | 10 | 7 | 79 |
| July | 14 | 47 | 8 | 2 | 71 |
| August | 37 | 15 | 7 | 3 | 62 |
| September | 24 | 12 | 2 | 5 | 43 |
| October | 48 | 19 | 4 | 1 | 72 |
| November | 69 | 14 | 4 | 2 | 89 |
| December | 48 | 18 | 4 | 1 | 71 |
| Total | 428 | 243 | 93 | 23 | 787 |
Source: FDA
Percentage of the causes
As shown in the figure, the “other causes” category was the main category in terms of number of notifications, accounting for 54 percent of the total. Microbiological causes accounted for 31 percent, followed by chemical causes (12 percent) and histamine (three percent).