Highlights of the January meeting in Memphis included:

• Standards to reduce the potential for contamination of feeds during the manufacturing process. A working group of the feed manufacturing committee is preparing a draft document to be further reviewed in April. The Food and Drug Administration is working on a similar scheme—the Animal Feed Safety System—designed to minimize risks to humans and animals from unsafe feeds. The working group discussed possible inconsistencies between the two approaches.
• U.S. Department of Agriculture inspection of pet foods. Some USDA-inspected meats are being diverted into pet foods. However, members agreed that it is inappropriate to use the USDA-inspected seal on pet foods that contain such meat because inspectors are not at the facility at the time the pet food is processed. According to the FDA, USDA’s voluntary inspection of pet food facilities will not produce a human-edible product. If a manufacturer states that its pet food is of human-edible quality, its claim must be well-qualified so it is not misleading.
• Carbohydrate claims. Because many equine and pet foods bear labels suggesting they are low in carbohydrates, a special task force was formed to consider whether AAFCO’s 40-year-old policy statement discouraging carbohydrate guarantees should be changed, and how guarantees should be expressed for low-carb products. [April 2005 PET AGE]