 The agency also has 223 field offices and 13 laboratories located throughout the 50 states, the United States Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico.In 2008, the FDA began to post employees to foreign countries, including China, India, Costa Rica, Chile, Belgium, and the United Kingdom.In recent years, the agency began undertaking a large-scale effort to consolidate its 25 operations in the Washington metropolitan area, moving from its main headquarters in Rockville and several fragmented office buildings to the former site of the Naval Ordnance Laboratory in the White Oak area of Silver Spring, Maryland.