WASHINGTON, Aug 10 (Reuters) - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Monday took steps to increase oversight of food additives as part ⁠of the Trump administration's "Make America Healthy Again" initiative.

President Donald Trump and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have worked to ⁠enact some priorities of the MAHA movement that supported Kennedy's 2024 presidential bid and later helped elect Trump, like ⁠curbing recommendations for some childhood vaccines.  

The FDA ‌on Monday issued a proposed rule that would require food manufacturers to notify the agency when they deem a food additive to be "Generally Recognized as Safe," or GRAS, according to HHS.

Since 1958, food companies have been permitted to self-affirm that food ingredients are safe without a full government review. Some common GRAS ‌ingredients include canola oil, black pepper and vinegar, according to an FDA webpage. 

The FDA ​strongly encourages ‌companies to notify the agency of new GRAS ‌ingredients, but they aren't required to. 

As a result, "we don't even know exactly how many chemicals are in the food that Americans ⁠eat every day," said Kennedy at an event in Washington ‌on Monday. 

The proposed rule would ⁠make that notification mandatory and expand ​a public inventory of those notices, the agency ‌said. 

The rule is being undertaken to "increase transparency and consumer confidence in the food supply," acting FDA Commissioner Kyle Diamantas said in a call with reporters. 

"Shifting to a mandatory notification system closes a decades-old information ​gap," Diamantas said.

The FDA is accepting comments on the proposed rule ‌for ‌120 days.

HHS and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have also submitted a proposed definition of ultra-processed food ‌for final review, HHS said ​in a press release. More details about the definition will come at a later date, Diamantas told reporters.

The FDA also plans on Tuesday to release guidance on minimizing biological hazards ⁠for processors of fresh-cut produce, Diamantas said. Ongoing outbreaks of salmonella and cyclosporiasis ‌affecting lettuce and jalapenos have sickened thousands of people in the U.S.

(Reporting by Leah Douglas in ​Washington; Editing by Paul Simao and Aurora Ellis)