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A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released yesterday finds that while the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has made strides in carrying out the 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), gaps remain in implementing the rules and in establishing the systems needed to measure whether the FDA's efforts are working. The FDA oversees nearly 80% of the US food supply, including fruits and vegetables, and Congress enacted FSMA to help shift the FDA's focus from foodborne-illness response to prevention. Key practices for federal performance management emphasize the need for agencies to define what they are trying to achieve, collect relevant information, and use that information to assess how well they are performing and identify how they could improve." 7 recommendations to improve foodborne-illness prevention In response, GAO made seven recommendations to the FDA to support the prevention of foodborne illness. Those recommendations include establishing timelines for setting adulteration guidelines, establishing milestones and timelines for food safety reports, reporting on the progress of implementing a national food emergency response laboratory network, updating recommended agricultural practices for fruit and vegetables, developing a plan for product tracing to enhance outbreak response processes, and implementing a performance-management process to assess the results of FDA's efforts."