The Association of Food & Drug Officials (AFDO) announced that it has implemented a new “Food Protection Program Portal” intended for use by all food safety regulatory officials.

The portal is located on the AFDO website (www.afdo.org) and is available to food safety regulatory officials regardless of their AFDO membership status. The individual must obtain a user name and password in order to access into the information portal.

The information portal is designed to provide food safety regulatory officials with useful information concerning food safety regulatory programs, pending and/or recently passed state legislation relating to food safety. Currently the portal contains license fees, inspection frequency policies, inspector-to-establishment ratio, 2012 and 2013 enacted state food safety laws, proposed state food safety legislation, and updates on federal legislation.

The portal will also provide officials with timely and valuable resource information. Resources currently available on the portal include a Subject Matter Expert (SME) Registry, Topical Index for Laws and Guidance, Directory of State and Local Officials, the Rapid Response Team (RRT’s) Best Practices Manual (2013), and the Issues and Concerns with Imported Foods guidance document.

The Topical Index for Laws and Guidance currently has more than 700 documents that can be easily accessed by topic or state.