[Federal Register: May 30, 2007 (Volume 72, Number 103)]
[Notices]
[Page 29944-29945]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr30my07-31]
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DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE
Food Safety and Inspection Service
[Docket No. FSIS-2007-0019]
National Advisory Committee on Microbiological Criteria for Foods
AGENCY: Food Safety and Inspection Service, USDA.
ACTION: Notice of public meeting.
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SUMMARY: This notice announces that the National Advisory Committee on
Microbiological Criteria for Foods (NACMCF) will hold public meetings
of the full Committee and subcommittees on June 4-8, 2007. The
Committee will discuss: (1) Determination of Cooking Parameters for
Safe Seafood for Consumers, (2) Assessment of the Food Safety
Importance of Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis, (3)
Determination of the Most Appropriate Technologies for the Food Safety
and Inspection Service to Adopt in Performing Routine and Baseline
Microbiological Analyses, and (4) Parameters for Inoculated Pack
Challenge Study Protocols.
DATES: The full Committee will hold open meetings on Monday, June 4,
2007, 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m., and Friday, June 8, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. The
Subcommittee on Determination of Cooking Parameters for Safe Seafood
for Consumers will hold an open meeting on Tuesday, June 5, 2007, from
8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. The Subcommittee on Determination of the Most
Appropriate Technologies for the Food Safety and Inspection Service to
Adopt in Performing Routine and Baseline Microbiological Analyses will
hold open meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday, June 5-6, 2007, from 8:30
a.m. to 5 p.m. The Subcommittee on Assessment of the Food Safety
Importance of Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis will hold
open meetings on Wednesday and Thursday, June 6-7, 2007, from 8:30 a.m.
to 5 p.m.
ADDRESSES: The June 5-7, 2007, subcommittee meetings will be held at
the Aerospace Building, 901 ``D'' St., SW., Rooms 369-371, Washington,
DC 20024. The June 4 and June 8, 2007, full Committee meetings will be
held in the conference room at the south end of the U. S. Department of
Agriculture (USDA) cafeteria located in the South Building, 1400
Independence Avenue, SW., Washington, DC 20250. All documents related
to the full Committee meetings will be available for public inspection
in the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) Docket Room, 300 12th
Street, SW., Room 102, Cotton Annex Building, Washington, DC 20250,
between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, as soon as they
become available. The NACMCF documents will also be available on the
Internet at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/regulations/2007_Notices_Index/.
FSIS will finalize an agenda on or before the meeting dates and
post it on the FSIS Internet Web page at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/News/Meetings_&_Events/.
Please note that the meeting agenda is subject to
change due to the time required for Committee discussions, thus,
sessions could start or end earlier or later than anticipated. Please
plan accordingly if you would like to attend a particular session or
participate in a public comment period.
Also, the official transcripts of the June 4 and 8, 2007, full
Committee meetings, when they become available, will be kept in the
FSIS Docket Room at the above address and will also be posted on http://www.fsis.usda.gov/About/NACMCF_Meetings/
.
The mailing address for the contact person below, Karen Thomas-
Sharp is: Food Safety and Inspection Service, U. S. Department of
Agriculture, Office of Public Health Science, Aerospace Center, Room
333, 1400 Independence Avenue, SW., Washington, DC 20250-3700.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Persons interested in making a
presentation, submitting technical papers, or providing comments at the
June 4 and/or June 8, plenary sessions should contact Karen Thomas-
Sharp, phone (202) 690-6620, Fax (202) 690-6334, e-mail address:
karen.thomas-sharp@fsis.usda.gov, or at the mailing address above.
Persons requiring a sign language interpreter or other special
accommodations should notify Mrs. Thomas-Sharp by May 29, 2007.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Background
The NACMCF was established in 1988, in response to a recommendation
of the National Academy of Sciences for an interagency approach to
microbiological criteria for foods, and in response to a recommendation
of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations, as
expressed in the Rural Development, Agriculture, and Related Agencies
Appropriation Bill for fiscal year 1988. The Charter for the NACMCF is
available for viewing on the FSIS Internet Web page at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/About/NACMCF_Charter/
.
The NACMCF provides scientific advice and recommendations to the
Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of Health and Human Services
on public health issues relative to the safety and wholesomeness of the
U.S. food supply, including development of microbiological criteria and
review and evaluation of epidemiological and risk assessment data and
methodologies for assessing microbiological hazards in foods. The
Committee also provides advice to the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention and the Departments of Commerce and Defense.
Dr. Curt Mann, Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety, USDA, is the
Committee Chair; Dr. Robert E. Brackett, Director of the Food and Drug
Administration's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN),
is the Vice-Chair; and Gerri Ransom, FSIS, is the Executive
Secretariat.
At the subcommittee meetings the week of June 5-7, 2007, the groups
will discuss:
[[Page 29945]]
The determination of cooking parameters for safe seafood
for consumers,
Assessment of the food safety importance of Mycobacterium
avium subspecies paratuberculosis, and
The determination of the most appropriate technologies for
the Food Safety and Inspection Service to adopt in performing routine
and baseline microbiological analyses.
Documents Reviewed by NACMCF
FSIS intends to make available to the public all materials that are
reviewed and considered by NACMCF regarding its deliberations.
Generally, these materials will be made available as soon as possible
after the full Committee meeting. Further, FSIS intends to make these
materials available in electronic format on the FSIS Web page, as well
as in hard copy format in the FSIS Docket Room. Often, an attempt is
made to make the materials available at the start of the full Committee
meeting when sufficient time is allowed in advance to do so.
Disclaimer: NACMCF documents and comments posted on the FSIS Web
site are electronic conversions from a variety of source formats. In
some cases, document conversion may result in character translation or
formatting errors. The original document is the official, legal copy.
In order to meet the electronic and information technology
accessibility standards in Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act,
NACMCF may add alternate text descriptors for non-text elements
(graphs, charts, tables, multimedia, etc.). These modifications only
affect the online copies of the documents.
Copyrighted documents will not be posted on the FSIS Web site, but
will be available for inspection in the FSIS Docket Room.
Additional Public Notification
Public awareness of all segments of rulemaking and policy
development is important. Consequently, in an effort to ensure that
minorities, women, and persons with disabilities are aware of this
notice, FSIS will announce it on-line through the FSIS Web page located
at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/regulations/2007_Notices_Index/. FSIS
will also make copies of this Federal Register publication available
through the FSIS Constituent Update, which is used to provide
information regarding FSIS policies, procedures, regulations, Federal
Register notices, FSIS public meetings, recalls and other types of
information that could affect or would be of interest to constituents
and stakeholders. The update is communicated via Listserv, a free
electronic mail subscription service for industry, trade and farm
groups, consumer interest groups, allied health professionals, and
other individuals who have asked to be included. The update is
available on the FSIS Web page. Through the Listserv and Web page, FSIS
is able to provide information to a much broader and more diverse
audience. In addition, FSIS offers an e-mail subscription service which
provides automatic and customized access to selected food safety news
and information. This service is available at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/news_&_events/email_subscription/.
Options range from recalls to
export information to regulations, directives, and notices. Customers
can add or delete subscriptions themselves and have the option to
password protect their account.
Done at Washington, DC on May 24, 2007.
David P. Goldman,
Acting Administrator.
[FR Doc. E7-10321 Filed 5-29-07; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3410-DM-P