What Drives Import Refusals?

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed to revamp its international and domestic screening system, and is the subject of a new-food safety bill. An importer first needs to submit information identifying the product, its quantity, country of origin, shipper, manufacturer, and importer to export a food product to the US. If the product is refused entry, the importer is informed, and may provide further information supporting the product's compliance or a plan to bring the product into compliance, such as relabeling. A decrease in employment by US industry is positively correlated with refusals. Although not strongly significant, a decrease in import price also leads to more refusals. Lobbying expenditure increases the number of refusals for those sectors and times where there is a high volume of imports. Decrease in employment for a particular sector is correlated with a higher number of refusals.