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Food safety regulator lifts ban on three poultry additives
Federal regulators are ditching the ban on three additives from ready-to-eat meals.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announced Wednesday that it finalized a rule to allow sodium benzoate, sodium propionate and benzoic acid into ready-to-eat turkey and chicken products.
They had not been allowed, despite being considered “generally safe” by the Food and Drug Administration, because the agency believed the chemicals could make the meat look less damaged and of “greater value.”
Last May, the FSIS issued a proposal to not simply allow specific issues of the three additives, but to lift the prohibition all together. In that proposal, the agency noted two petitions filed by Kraft Foods and Kemin Food Technologies that claimed the substances do not increase shelf life or “conceal or mask damage or inferiority.”
They will become effective on May 7.
