Over the past few years, the numbers of food product recalls increased dramatically. In 2017, there were 440 recalls of U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA_ regulated products. Of these, 133 involved USDA-regulated products. By carefully studying the types and causes of these recalls, we can identify food-safety failures and develop strategies to avoid repeating past mistakes.
While the total pounds of USDA-regulated products recalled in 2017 was less than the totals in 2016, there were 10 more recalls in 2017 than in 2016. In 2016, a total of 58,140,787 pounds of USDA-inspected products were recalled. In 2017, that number dropped to 20,910,547. Thus, while the number of recalls increased from 122 to 133, this represents a substantial overall improvement.