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  1. Communications & Outreach

ORA’s Return-on-Investment Assessment for State Partnership Agreements

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and our regulatory partners have a shared mission: Ensuring the food we eat is safe. This mission can only be achieved by fully leveraging the resources, expertise, and capabilities as part of an integrated food safety system. 

In close collaboration with our regulatory partners, the FDA/Office of Regulatory Affairs (ORA) has implemented multiple programs to strengthen our partnerships and advance food safety over the past several years. ORA is conducting a comprehensive return-on-investment (ROI) assessment across these domestic human and animal food partnership programs as part of our commitment to continuous improvement. The scope of our analysis will cover funded programs, such as the state inspection contracts and capacity building efforts supported through grants and cooperative agreements. The analysis will also include other ORA programs and services that support partnerships, such as training, partnership agreements, and data exchange.

Our goal is to understand the collective long-term costs and benefits of each partnership program across our State, Local, Tribal and Territorial (SLTT) partners and regulatory associations. For example, understanding the sustainability of a partnership program, both for the FDA and our regulatory partners, promotes better long-term resource planning and helps to prevents budgetary challenges and operational disruption for both the FDA and our SLTT partners. The assessment will also help measure the relevance that these partnership programs have in promoting not just the FDA’s mission and priorities, but the missions and priorities of our regulatory partners. As we continue advancing a stronger, more collaborative relationship with state and local agencies, the crucial perspectives and insights of our regulatory partners will be actively solicited over the coming months and fully incorporated into the assessment. 

The assessment’s findings will capture the historical and comparative analysis of various partnership programs and include initial recommendations intended to support, advance, and inform future state partner initiatives. In addition, the assessment serves to provide a foundational evaluative framework of ORA and partner programs and, as such, poses no immediate impact or disruptive changes to ongoing operations. Once this assessment is complete, ORA looks forward to sharing the findings and seeking feedback from our partners on the proposed recommendations and how best to further a cooperative environment where our shared mission is mutually advanced through these partnership programs. The continued close collaboration with our regulatory partners is essential to ensuring potential initiatives and changes are mutually beneficial and provide long-term, sustainable solutions.

Please feel free to provide any questions, comments, or concerns related to this project to our centralized mailbox.

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