The Association of Food and Drug Officials (AFDO) has supported national uniformity in the regulation of foods, drugs, cosmetics, and consumer products throughout its 105 year history. No single organization has promoted the principles of uniformity more than AFDO through debate, negotiation and consensus building using federal, state, and industry perspectives. As a result, AFDO has forged partnerships and alliances to develop model codes, official guidelines, and training programs. These partnerships have received national recognition within the President Clinton's Food Safety Initiative for addressing current and future strategies for improved food safety. As strongly as AFDO supports national uniformity, AFDO opposes subordinating the states' fundamental obligation to act to protect pubic health in the absence of clear national standards or when there are regional public health concerns not adequately covered by national standards.

Many current and pending laws as well as states' requirements in the area of food, drugs and cosmetics are developed through joint efforts of multi-state cooperative associations, the federal agencies, academia, other conferences, and industry. Historically, laws developed by states in the absence of federal requirements have served as pilots and as a basis for improved federal requirements. In general, once federal laws are enacted, state laws are changed or rescinded to ensure uniformity.

It is of great concern that Congress is now pursuing broad preemption of individual state food safety authorities, to regulate the safety, manufacture, labeling and display of food, drugs, and cosmetics because of a perceived burden that states have significantly non-uniform laws. This is simply not true. States must have the right to act quickly to enact laws that address local and statewide public health concerns that cannot be anticipated or are not adequately addressed nationally. Where there is limited preemption, provisions must be available for the state to have a different law when justified by local or regional need for consumer protection. The exemption provisions provided under the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act are not acceptable as they do not provide a reasonable mechanism for exemption. Any exemption provision must include a reasonable time certain for a definitive decision from the federal agency, and it must not include areas where final federal rules have not been implemented and state laws, therefore, are not specifically preempted.

The pursuit of broad preemption is at odds with the current policies. The Food Safety Initiative and the federal agencies recognize states as the prime laboratories for "government reinvention" and recognize federal-state cooperation, as opposed to federal exclusivity, as a major goal in achieving safer foods. In 1999, State programs alone contributed more than $300 Billion to safeguard the nations food supply. Food safety is an area of joint government and industry responsibility where public health risks cannot always be anticipated and where the federal government cannot be omnipresent. Declining federal resources will continue to shift the burden of public safety to the states and make it even less likely that citizens can rely on timely, responsive federal action. Therefore, the states must have the flexibility to address emerging issues.

Any federal requirement that interferes with the states' abilities to establish or enforce laws and/or regulations for foods, drugs, or cosmetics, when there is not specific existing federal standards obstructs states' obligations and responsibilities to protect it's citizenry.