Animal Food Regulatory Program Alliance

The goal of FDA/ORA's Cooperative Agreement Program is to facilitate long-term improvements to the national food safety system by strengthening interagency collaboration, improving States' regulatory and surveillance protection programs for manufactured foods, conducting research, and promotion of the Animal Food Regulatory Program Standards (AFRPS). Objectives include: 1. Support the efforts of federal and state government agencies to build a national integrated animal food safety system; 2. Establish systems for sharing, promotion, and collaboration of best practices, guidance documents, sampling plans, procedures, memorandums of understanding, and other tools to facilitate and encourage mutual reliance between federal and state animal food regulatory programs and public health agencies; 3. Identify, develop, deliver promote, and/or assist with attendance of animal food safety training programs to support implementation of the AFRPS, as well as training and stakeholder support for provisions of FSMA; and 4. Support the advancement of the AFRPS and future revisions of the AFRPS as part of a system of continuous improvement to ensure the standards are modernized and support the needs of animal food regulatory programs.

The national associations /organizations eligible to apply for funding under this cooperative agreement must be a national organization that represents State animal food regulatory programs as a primary purpose. National Associations/Organizations have the membership, resources, structure, and expertise necessary to build national consensus amongst state agencies on key animal food safety issues. They are the primary means for communication and collaboration on issues of national significance for state agencies. The outcomes are position statements, resolutions, and legislation that are uniformly supported by state agencies. National Associations/Organizations are also viewed as primary sources for educational opportunities and current information, such as proposed legislation and emerging food safety issues.The association’s principle purpose must be to act as a leader and a resource to State animal food regulatory agencies in developing strategies to resolve and promote public health and consumer protection related to the regulation of manufactured foods. Additionally, the association must have knowledge on the infrastructure, capacity, strengths and needs of State animal food protection programs. The association must have successful experience in carrying out national efforts to build an integrated food safety system, which includes Federal, State, and local agencies. The association must be comprised of regular members that are officials of State regulatory agencies that administer animal foods inspection programs in conjunction and in collaboration with FDA.

Applicants should review the individual Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) issued under this CFDA program to see the specific evaluation criteria that applies.