SILVER SPRING, MD. — The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released the details of its $8.4 billion budget request on March 28. The request is part of the President’s fiscal year 2023 budget and represents about a $2.1 billion (34%) increase from the agency’s fiscal 2022 budget.

According to the FDA, the increased budget is necessary for public health modernization, food and medical safety programs, as well as for other public health infrastructure. The administration is seeking about $3.7 billion in budget authority, $3 billion in user fees and $1.6 billion in mandatory funding to support future pandemic preparedness.

“The funding outlined in this year’s FDA budget request is critical to fulfilling the agency’s mission as we continue our work on a wide range of COVID-19 and non-COVID priorities,” said Robert Califf, M.D., commissioner of the FDA. “The FDA has focused our budget request on some of today’s most urgent needs such as human and animal food safety, medical device security and e-cigarette oversight. We also continue to look ahead at our role in public health, including at ways to modernize our efforts to keep pace with evolving science, technology and potential public health emergencies.”

Of the $8.4 billion budget, about $81 million is geared toward animal and pet food safety, inspections and health nutrition equity:

• $43 million for animal food safety oversight to improve the administration’s food safety practices as part of the New Era of Smarter Food Safety initiative, which will build upon the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA).
• $14 million to improve health equity through nutrition, which will support the Healthy and Safe Food For All program to reduce chemicals and toxins in human and animal foods.
• $24 million to optimize facility inspections, which will also increase the administration’s inspection capacity as well as improve the efficiency of human and animal food facility inspections.

Many of these budget requests will aid the administration in establishing partnerships with state governments and increasing personnel and capacity.

“Additional funding brings new ways to leverage opportunities to protect and advance the health of every American with reliable and science-based information,” Califf said. “We look forward to continuing our work with Congress to help meet the critical public health challenges ahead.”

As well as the budget 2023 proposal, the FDA also released legislative proposals on human dietary supplement regulation, infant formula and other medical foods, drug and biologic approval, generic drug approval, destruction of products posing public health risks and the medical device supply chain.

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