FSMA Animal Feed Rule

Background

FDA promotes animal health through its oversight of veterinary pharmaceuticals and animal feed sold in commerce. The FSMA animal feed rule (Current Good Manufacturing Practice and Hazard Analysis and Risk-Based Preventative Controls for Foods for Animals) and a complementary rule for foreign suppliers give strong new authority to FDA to ensure the safety of animal feed. But NPPC contends that FDA has exceeded its mandate by extending the feed rule to cover not just commercial animal feed but also the preparation by animal owners of non-medicated feed intended solely for their own animals. The animal feed rule does contain an exemption for livestock operations that meet the definition of “farm” from having to comply with the rule’s requirements. Contract grower operations, an important component of U.S. pork production, however, are specifically excluded from that definition. Pork producers who have a private feed mill to supply their contract growers will need to comply with the animal feed rule – to the same extent as commercial feed suppliers – even though they are only producing feed for animals they own. That places an undue and unwarranted burden on those producers, who pose no greater significant risk than producers who fall under the farm definition.