Food and Nutrition

Food Adulteration

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Adulterated food is impure, unsafe, or unwholesome food.  Adulteration is a legal term meaning that a food product fails to meet federal or state standards. Adulteration is an addition of another substance to a food item in order to increase the quantity of the food item in raw form or prepared form, which may result in the loss of actual quality of food item. These substances may be other available food items or non-food items. Among meat and meat products some of the items used to adulterate are water or ice, carcasses, or carcasses of animals other than the animal meant to be consumed. Food and Drug Administration regulates and enforces laws on food safety as well as Food Defense after the Food Safety and Modernization Act was passed in 2011. If a food is adulterated, FDA and FSIS have a broad array of enforcement tools.They are of various types. These include seizing and condemning the product, detaining imported product, enjoining persons from manufacturing or distributing the product, or requesting a recall of the product. Enforcement action is usually preceded by a Warning Letter from FDA to the manufacturer or distributor of the adulterated product.