More than 350 participants gathered online on Thursday 25 March 2021 to learn more about the risks of contamination of animal food and feed from carryover – a process of feed contamination that can occur during feed processing, handling, transportation, delivery or in feeding animals on-farm, when residues of veterinary drugs are unintentionally transferred to a food-producing animal. The meeting was an opportunity to discuss the publication of an FAO/WHO expert meeting report entitled Carryover in feed and transfer from feed [...]

A webinar taking place on 5 February 2021, 12:00-13:30 CET, entitled Feed safety – Good Practices for the Feed Sector Matter, will bring together experts from FAO and the International Feed Industry Federation (IFIF) to discuss the importance of feed safety in the sustainable production of safe food of animal origin. The event will also see the launch of a new manual on implementing the Codex Alimentarius Code of Practice on Good Animal Feeding. Primary producers, including farmers and the feed [...]

Steve Wearne, Vice-Chairperson of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, from the United Kingdom, spoke at the Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Agreement (or SPS) committee’s thematic session on 3 November 2020, to explain the value that voluntary third-party assurance (vTPA) can add to National Food Control Systems.  Participants heard about the UK experience of using vTPA data in a new approach to animal feed inspection and enforcement, which has achieved an 83 percent reduction in official inspections, while investing more than ever [...]

A joint seminar/webinar organized by FAO Animal Production and Health Division, the Statistics Division and the FAO Livestock Technical Network entitled: How can we improve data gathering on antimicrobial usage at national level? Lessons from Uganda. will take place on Thursday 15 October 2020 from 11:00-12:00 (GMT+2).   Zoom Registration. Click here for further details.

The European Union (EU) is celebrating the 40 years of the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed. Food safety is an issue of national and international significance, an issue that affects all countries and has a substantial impact on both public health and economic activity. Operating since 1979, RASFF is one of the great success stories of the EU’s integrated approach to food safety, showing the power of communication and collaboration. By providing a system for the swift exchange of [...]

Medicated feed is one important route for administering veterinary medicinal products to animals, in particular to animals intended for food production. It can be difficult to administer a veterinary drug to an animal, especially in the case of smaller species typically reared in large groups such as a flock of birds or a school of fish where there would be hundreds of animals that all need to be treated at the same time. The use of medicated feed provides an simple, [...]

The role of animal nutrition and feed strategies and options for reducing the need to use antimicrobials in animal production was highlighted in a side event during a meeting of the Ad hoc Codex Intergovernmental Task Force on Antimicrobial Resistance that took place in Busan, Republic of Korea, from 10 to 14 December 2018. The speakers summarized the current state of the art and recent insights on how diets, gut health and the immune system interact and could contribute to disease [...]

FAO and WHO are currently seeking experts, stakeholders and data related to the carry-over from feed to food of unavoidable and unintended residues of approved veterinary drugs. The three calls have been issued in preparation of the FAO/WHO Stakeholder Meeting on 7 January 2019 and the Expert Consultation Meeting on 8 to 11 January 2019 in Rome, Italy. The 23rd Codex Committee on Residue of Veterinary Drugs in Food has requested FAO and WHO to provide scientific advice to address the [...]

Feed Safety Multi-stakeholder Partnership Survey on guidance material (tools, methods, manuals, etc.) on how to conduct risk assessment for feed What is the objective of the survey? The FAO facilitated Feed Safety Multi-stakeholder Partnership is conducting this survey to take stock and collect currently available material (e.g. tools, methods, manuals) on how to conduct risk assessment for feed. This is done, as part of preparing practical guidance and training materials (manual and other tools) to support the implementation of the Codex Alimentarius [...]

The 10th International Feed Regulators Meeting (IFRM) organized by IFIF in cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) brought together a record number of feed industry representatives and government officials from 35 countries to discuss key issues including Feed Safety Risk Management Strategies and the role of animal nutrition and feeding to minimise antimicrobial resistance (AMR). The meeting was also informed on the activities of the FAO led Multi-stakeholder Partnership for Capacity Development for Feed [...]