Feed code of practice welcomed

THE FOUR largest members of the International Feed Industry Federation have welcomed the UN‘s adoption of an international code of good animal feeding practice.

The code was nearly adopted by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations‘s Codex Alimentarius Commission in 2003, but disagreement on some sections meant that UN adoption of the whole code had to wait for a year.

At a recent Geneva meeting, the CAC voted for the code in full and immediately recommended it for adoption by its 130-plus member states.

“The code is a milestone for the feed industry. It will form a global foundation for our industry in terms of feed and food safety,” said IFIF UK general secretary Roger Gilbert at the first-ever “F4 Feed Summit”, a meeting of the IFIF’s four largest members (China, Brazil, the EU and the US) in London this week.

“Codex member states are obliged to adopt the new code of best practice into national legislation, and we see the code as a first step in leveling the playing field in the manufacture and use of safe feedingstuffs everywhere,” Mr Gilbert said.

The practical implication of the code is that food safety remains equally important no matter where animal products are produced.

As Mr Gilbert pointed out, whether a soybean feeds a domestic chicken or is shipped halfway round the world to feed a chicken in a third country, the resulting meat products must be equally safe, and it is this that the code will help ensure.