September 5, 2014 10:53AM # The FDA vs. Fine Cheese: A Wedge Too Far By [Walter Olson](https://www.cato.org/people/walter-olson) --- SHARE \[cross-posted, slightly adapted, from [Overlawyered](http://overlawyered.com/2014/09/fda-restrictions-keeping-great-cheeses-stores/)\] It’s happening just as [warned](https://www.cato.org/blog/lame-ducks-locavores-food-safety). [Janet Fletcher at the *Los Angeles Times*](http://www.latimes.com/food/dailydish/la-dd-new-fda-regulations-cheeses-20140903-story.html) reports: > …cheese counters could soon be a lot less aromatic, with several popular cheeses falling victim to a more zealous U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Roquefort — France’s top-selling blue — is in the agency’s cross hairs along with raw-milk versions of Morbier, St. Nectaire and Tomme de Savoie. … > > > Of course, French creameries haven’t changed their recipes for any of these classic cheeses. But their wheels are flunking now because the FDA has drastically cut allowances for a typically harmless bacterium by a factor of 10. The new rules have resulted in holds even on super-safe Parmigiano Reggiano, and the risk of losing a costly shipment of a perishable commodity is likely to be enough to drive many European producers out of the market for export to America entirely. Highly praised artisanal cheese makers in the United States are facing [shutdown as well](http://www.chicagoreader.com/Bleader/archives/2014/08/20/american-regulators-vs-american-cheese). Earlier on the FDA and cheese regulation in this space [here](https://www.cato.org/blog/lame-ducks-locavores-food-safety) (predictions before the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010, or FSMA, passed) and at Overlawyered [here](http://overlawyered.com/2010/11/food-safety-bill-goodbye-artisanal-cheese/), [here](http://overlawyered.com/2014/06/fda-backs-wood-aging-cheese/), [here](http://overlawyered.com/2014/06/fda-moves-ban-cheese-aging-wooden-boards/), etc. They told us this administration was going to be run by wine-and-cheese liberals. Now where are they when they could do us some good? ##### Related Tags [Regulation](https://www.cato.org/regulatory-studies) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).