The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) recently announced an update to its guidelines for label approval that focuses on clarifying the requirements for voluntary U.S.-origin label claims on FSIS-regulated products. The agency summarized the revisions to the recently updated label approval guidelines in a regulatory notice.

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Updated research, supported by the U.S. Poultry & Egg Association (USPOULTRY) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), was released this week quantifying the U.S. poultry industry’s on-farm antibiotic use. The updated report shows continued improved antibiotic stewardship and commitment to disease prevention within poultry production. As part of its commitment to a transparent and sustainable food supply, the poultry industry works to balance the responsible use of antibiotics considered “medically important” to human health with the need to maintain healthy poultry flocks.

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A University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign research team has received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to participate in a retail surveillance program that monitors meat products for resistant bacteria. This project supports the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) by expanding retail food antimicrobial resistance (AMR) surveillance in Illinois.

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Consumer loyalty and rewards app Fetch is releasing its first full-year Fetch Finds Report, revealing the unexpected ways Americans shopped and dined in 2025. Despite rising grocery costs, Americans brought meat back to the menu. Fresh beef (+13%), chicken (+12%) and pork (+12%) sales rose, while refrigerated plant-based alternatives (-11%) fell, signaling that the meatless movement lost some of its sizzle in 2025.

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U.S. total broiler slaughter data for the week ending December 13, 2025, is estimated by USDA’s Poultry Market News Service to be 171,478,000 broilers, a 3-percent increase from the same week a year earlier.

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Happy holidays from NCC!

On December 19, 2025, in Holidays, by Tom

The staff at NCC wishes you and your families a very Merry Christmas, the Happiest of Holidays and a Blessed New Year. The NCC Washington Report will resume on January 9, 2026.

 

Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) on Wednesday introduced legislation to allow hatcheries to use pasteurized eggs in egg products, like cake mixes, salad dressings, and other grocery products. The Lowering Egg Prices Act of 2025 will help increase the egg supply for consumers by cutting bureaucratic red tape that forces hatcheries to discard hundreds of millions of safe, useable eggs each year.

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The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced on Monday it will make $12 billion available in one-time bridge payments to American farmers in response to temporary trade market disruptions and increased production costs. The package includes $11 billion in one-time payments to crop farmers through a new USDA bridge payment program and the remaining $1 billion will then go to specialty crops not covered by that program. It does not include livestock and poultry.

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A coalition of major food and beverage trade groups filed a lawsuit Friday seeking to halt a new Texas law that would require warning labels on products containing certain synthetic food additives. The American Beverage Association, Consumer Brands Association, National Confectioners Association, and FMI – The Food Industry Association – jointly lodged the suit, calling the proposed labels “false and misleading,” according to Reuters.

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