The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) helps safeguard the ability of the United States Food and Drug Administration to ensure food safety and quality within North America. NAFTA is an agreement between Canada, the US and Mexico that took effect on January 1, 1994, designed to increase the scope for the free flow trade and investment among these three countries. The US Food and Drug Administration (US FDA), which participated in the negotiation of NAFTA, has reviewed the US Food and Drug Administration standards for safety, purity and appropriate labeling of foods and has determined that these standards are consistent with the terms of the agreement. This is why no changes in US Food and Drug Administration standards are needed or proposed to implement NAFTA.
NAFTA does not change existing or future US Food and Drug Administration standards regarding pesticide use or pesticide and other chemical residue or contaminant standards for fresh or processed foods. NAFTA provisions safeguard the ability of the US Food Drug Administration to ensure food safety. In short, existing US Food and Drug Administration standards will continue to be applied to imported foods as well as domestically produced foods. This means that the U.S. will continue to prohibit any food shipments determined not to meet pesticide residue or other food safety requirements.
NAFTA has no effect on U.S. Food and Drug Administration laws and regulations in the area of safety, effectiveness, and appropriate labeling of human and animal drugs and medical devices. Any products coming into the U.S. must continue to meet all US FDA standards and requirements.
Additionally, NAFTA does not change or affect US Food Drug Administration laws and regulations with respect to US Food and Drug safety and appropriate labeling of dietary supplements imported in to the U.S.
U.S. FDA and TWG
Within the auspices of the NAFTA, the three countries have developed a technical working group on pesticides called TWG. It serves as a focal point for all issues related to pesticides for these countries. TWG’s aim is to ensure that the countries can be assured of the legality and safety of foods produced in any of the NAFTA countries. US food and drug administration is providing trilateral cooperation between Mexico and Canada to enforce the TWG standards.
Article 723(6) makes explicit that any party challenging a U.S. Food and Drug Administration safety measure would have the burden of showing that the US Food and Drug measure is inconsistent with NAFTA. Whether any particular level of protection is “appropriate” is a social and political judgment that the agreement reserves for the government applying the measure (see Articles 712(2) and 724). As provided in Article 712, a sanitary measure is to be based on a risk assessment “as appropriate to the circumstances,” and is not to be maintained where there is no longer a scientific basis for it. US Food and Drug Administration standards are already based on risk assessments and have a scientific basis. These NAFTA requirements help assure that measures applied by the other parties will not unfairly exclude U.S. food exports.
By: Russell K Statman
The United States Food and Drug Administration and NAFTA
March 10th, 2010 by admin No comments »Colloidal Silver Administration and Argyria
March 10th, 2010 by admin No comments »
For many years, silver and its compounds have been avoided in medical practice for fear of the supposedly skin-staining side effect known as Argyria. Studies show that only overexposure to silver salts as well as over dosage in uncontrolled therapeutic administration may lead to the deposition of the mineral at the level of the soft membranes, skin and nails. The Argyria cases are mainly specific to the industrial contact with silver salts, affecting workers in silver mining, metal manufacturing, silver refining and so on. Colloidal silver homeopathic supplements may be administered without the risk of getting Argyria on the one condition that the therapeutic or prophylactic dosage be strictly followed.
The early symptoms of Argyria include staining of the gums that afterwards extends to skin or other soft membranes particularly on the areas exposed to the sun: hands, forehead and nose. However, mention should be made that clinical and physical symptoms appear within years of exposure to silver compounds as a high amount of silver gets deposited in the tissues. Silver doesn’t accumulate only in special parts of the body; it is usually spread throughout the system, though you may not see the outward signs.
Argyria treatment involves first and foremost the end of exposure to silver compounds; if you’ve been taking a high dosage of colloidal silver for a long time now and you start showing bluish stains on the skin, it’s a clear sign you’ve administrated too large an amount. Depigmentation products may not be enough to treat Argyria satisfactorily, but it will reduce the number of granules deposited in the upper skin layers and around the sweat glands. Use opaque cosmetics with a high sunscreen level as further depigmentation could be prevented, and they will also mask the already installed Argyria signs.
How can one prevent Argyria? The only way to do so is to avoid taking too large dosages of a colloidal silver product that you’ve been recommended. Silver is absorbed at the sublingual and digestive level in a matter of minutes; then it remains in the system for a few weeks and is afterwards safely eliminated through excretions. Normal dosage does not present any risk to the user; furthermore, even if you took more colloidal silver than you should have, don’t worry about turning blue over night. Even taken like that, colloidal silver is not risky for your body, as it takes months of over-administration to develop Argyria.
By: Ben W Taylor
Identifying Genuine Data Entry Jobs Among Thousands of Scams
March 8th, 2010 by admin No comments »
There are thousands of data entry jobs and various kinds of data entry jobs available in the internet. Any person who wishes to work from home can join these data entry jobs and earn money by just keying in the computer having an internet. These data entry jobs are not of the same nature but differ depending on the client requirements. But it is important to choose the right kind of legitimate job in the internet.
In traditional data entry jobs, you have to key the data given and save it in the specific format requested and send it to the customer. You will be paid based on the number of keys or words you have typed. You are required to have a good typing skill with speed and accuracy. The customer will give instructions on formatting the text, alignment and insertion of tags if any is required. There are various types of inputs available like PDF, Tiff, Rtf, SGML, HTML, .doc etc. You will be given data in any of the formats and asked to key the same and save it in the format required by the client. This is not a very tough job. You have to key what you see.
In these data entry job, quality of keyed data is the deciding factor for earning more revenue. If you have typed without any spelling mistakes and followed the instructions perfectly and produced the output within the turnaround time specified, you will be paid well.
For a genuine traditional data entry job, look for the input type, instructions to follow, quality procedure, turn around time etc and make sure you join the right program. Here, the more the keyed in data with quality output, the more the revenue.
There are various resources to find out genuine data entry jobs in the internet. You can identify the resources for data entry jobs using search engines around the internet, using various web forums, renowned company web sites etc. Also some companies do outsourcing their jobs to home based working people.
But there are lots of scammers spread across the internet. Their main motto is to grab your money or get your financial information and abscond as soon as they collect huge money. By outlook, we cannot differentiate scammers and others, but meticulously we have to look for selecting the right opportunity. Do not jump into conclusions just by fancy advertisements or jazzy words and hi-fi promises given in the web site. Before signing up any formality or joining any programs, always do a consultation with Better Business Bureau (BBB) or Small Business Administration (SBA). And also you can post your queries in various web forums and get public opinions. This will also give a better idea to carry out the respective data entry job.
Filling survey forms is also a kind of data entry job.
Surveys are very important for companies to develop the products or services according to the need of the market. There are so many Market Research firms available in the e-market who take care of such surveys and give report to these companies for better designing of the product or services. The market research firms hire people for doing online market research as the public opinions are worth a lot. When you do such surveys, you have to key in information about the questionnaire or the opinions asked about the product or service rendered by various companies. The payment will be based on the number of surveys you have completed online
There are so many data entry jobs available in the e-market. It is very important to select a genuine data entry job because most of the data entry jobs available in the internet show a different path. The indication for choosing the legitimate data entry job is that the company will pay you and not the other way around.
By: Vijaya Kumar
