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Completing Your Comprehensive Strategic Improvement Plan

About the CSIP

A CSIP is a Comprehensive Strategic Improvement Plan. It is considered a multiyear planning document for jurisdictions to use to determine how to obtain and maintain compliance with the Retail Program Standards. CSIPs are living documents that will need to be evaluated and changed as the jurisdiction grows and changes over time. The CSIP is created from your Self-Assessment of All 9 Standards (SA9) and is meant to be a roadmap to completing all un-met Standard criteria in a five-year Self Assessment cycle.

CSIP Format

Awarded jurisdictions should use the SAVA Gap Analysis Tool provided by FDA, available below:

  1. CSIP Gap Analysis Tool | Spreadsheet

Required Elements for CSIP Completion and Payment for Deliverable

  • Any Standard(s) not yet met by your jurisdiction and any individual Standard Sub-Element(s) not yet met for those Standards.
  • Action Steps / Tasks Required to address the Standard(s) and Sub-Element(s) not yet met.
  • The Individual Lead for each of the Action Steps / Tasks Required.
  • The Target Completion Dates for each of the Action Steps / Tasks Required.

Future Changes

  • Target Completion Dates and Individual Leads responsible for Action Steps / Tasks Required may need to change throughout the course of the grant cycle. The plan does not need to be resubmitted if changes are made on these items.
  • Remember that this document is for you and your jurisdiction as you set your path towards conforming with the Retail Program Standards. Use realistic timelines, then revisit your CSIP regularly to update and adjust as needed.
  • Awarded jurisdictions may use the SAVA Gap Analysis spreadsheet provided by FDA. NEHA is developing this into a digital, online, automated tool, which will be called the Retail Standards Assessment (RSA) Tool. Jurisdictions that have already completed their most recent SA9/CSIP on a different template will not be required to use the Gap Analysis spreadsheet. For those who have not completed their CSIP, we encourage you to use the FDA Gap Analysis spreadsheet to easily transport your data into the RSA Tool at the end of the year.
  • The RSA Tool will be available in fall 2025, with the option to copy and paste fields from the existing SAVA Gap Analysis into the system. NEHA will provide multiple training sessions, a user guide, and recorded videos to help you with our online RSA tool. Once the tool is live and training sessions have been scheduled, an announcement will be made.

Completing Your CSIP

  1. Complete a Self-Assessment of all 9 Retail Program Standards (SA9). You do not need to meet any of the Standards; the SA9 is solely a program assessment of all 9 Standards.

  2. Review the CSIP Instructions and Template using the link on this page.

  3. Use the template provided for your CSIP.

  4. Use data obtained from your completed and current SA9 to complete the CSIP. The Gap Analysis Template above will generate your CSIP structure from your completed SA9 information.
  5. Complete the CSIP ensuring all necessary information listed above is included.