The Consultation restricted its considerations to food safety matters that pertained strictly to feeds. It did not consider plant toxins or radionuclides, nor did it consider parasites such as Taenia saginata that are spread by human sewage. In addition, the risks to human health from feed or forage contaminated with several other agents such as Bacillus anthracis, Clostridium botulinum toxin, Listeria spp., Mycobacterium bovis and Yersinia spp. appear to be negligible or non-existent and were therefore not considered by the Consultation. It also did not consider management practices unrelated to feeding, such as vaccination or other veterinary treatments including the use of injectable agents or drenches. It did not consider spoilage of food products nor did it consider normal feeding practices aimed at maintaining good nutritional status of production animals.
While there are a great many foods that are of animal origin, the Consultation restricted its consideration to those foods from common domestic animals which have significance in international trade. These include meat and meat products, milk and milk products, eggs and egg products, and products of aquatic animals derived from aquaculture. All animal feeds were considered other than natural unrestricted grazing. The Consultation limited its considerations to food that complies with CAC recommendations, for example meat judged to be fit for human consumption in accordance with the Recommended International Code for Ante-mortem and Post-mortem Inspection of Slaughter Animals and for ante-mortem and post-mortem Judgement of Slaughter Animals and Meat (CAC/RCP 41-1993). As one example, this excluded consideration of foodborne anthrax.
Aquaculture products are a major source of food protein in developing countries and one of the fastest growing systems of food production. There are two broad categories of aquatic animal production. One involves the production of carnivorous/omnivorous fish using intensive farming systems and is largely dependent upon the use of compounded feed, while the other is based on the mass production of herbivorous/filter feeding fish species within semi-intensive/extensive farming systems based on the use of agricultural and other by-products, including animal manure, as fertilizer or supplementary feed inputs. Intensive fish farming using compounded feed therefore clearly fell within the scope of the Consultation. However, as semi-intensive/extensive systems arc being considered by the WHO/FAO/NACA1 Study Group on Food Safety Issues associated with Products from Aquaculture, this was not considered.
NACA is the Network of Aquaculture Centres in the Asia-Pacific Region.
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