AWMA hosted a conference call this week with members of the Industry Affairs and Government Affairs committees on the topic of the regulatory implementation of the new Food and Drug Administration (FDA) tobacco law and the recent call for comments by that agency.  AWMA is in the process of drafting comments to be submitted to the FDA by the end of September in an effort to ensure that the distributor’s voice is heard by that agency as they work to implement the new law giving FDA broad federal regulatory powers over tobacco.  

Participation in the call was heavy and members offered helpful input to ensure that all areas of distributor concern would be addressed in the initial submission of comments with the FDA.  Among the many issues to be included in the comments are the following:

• The need for “sell through” provisions with respect to many of the regulations to be issued giving time to distributors to sell through product before new regulations take effect;
• Emphasize that effective record-keeping and tracking methods are already in place and that new regulations calling for additional rules would be burdensome and costly;
• Ensure that FDA continues to solicit our input and understand our industry to ensure the most reasonable, effective regulations are promulgated as a result of this new law.

AWMA is working hard to keep members continuously up-to-date on the most recent developments with respect to the ramifications of the recently passed FDA tobacco legislation and our involvement with the regulatory process on this issue is a top priority for our association.  As part of this effort, AWMA has reached out to the FDA to ask their participation in our upcoming Summit/ABX program in Atlanta.