Official Feed Control - Annual Report 2020

ABSTRACT

On behalf of the Federal Office for Agriculture (FOAG), Agroscope monitors the production and distribution of food for livestock and pets. The main purpose of its activity is to prevent harmful substances and undesirable products from being fed to animals and reaching consumers' plates through foodstuffs of animal origin. Controls also help to protect owners of animals against fraud and to preserve animal health and the environment. Official Food Control enforcement activities for animals have also been disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic and inspections had to be completely suspended. However, it was possible to resume them after a short period, although in a limited way, by applying the necessary hygiene and precautionary measures. In order to protect the inspectors and employees of the companies inspected, controls have been suspended for fifteen days in March, and then were resumed until the end of the year, but by being announced and by favouring the taking of samples. In this way it was possible to minimize contact with people and counter the spread of the virus by respecting the prescribed protection measures. The integration carried out at the end of 2019 of all the data relating to inspections, companies and products in a new laboratory information management system (LIMS) proved to be successful, although many optimizations and improvements had to be made. Due to increased data security and integration into a interdisciplinary system, production companies of animal feed thus benefited from more shipments, inspection report improved and there were more user-friendly presentation of test results in the product control report. Inspection reports were all able to be sent quickly and those of the checks of products were able to be sent following the analyses and necessary repetitions, thus guaranteeing a return of information in a timely manner. As in previous years, we also observed an increase of more than the average of new registrations/approvals companies in the animal feed sector. While 2019 can be considered a calm year in terms of feed safety, Salmonella was detected in eight animal feeds in 2020, representing 4 separate cases. In one sample, an overrun of the maximum value of coccidiostats according to appendix 10 of OLALA was detected. In 4 other samples, the authorizations issued for the addition of coccidiostats according to animal species had expired. GMOs were detected in two food samples for production animals, one of which was authorized but was not been declared. The second case concerns the contamination of undesirable seeds without germination power in linseed. In addition, GMOs exceeding the tolerance threshold have been detected in three bird feed mixtures and in another ambrosia seed mixture. These products were withdrawn from the market immediately. A total of 1,217 feed samples for livestock and for pets were analysed. 814 were compliant or had minor reporting errors. With a compliance rate of 66.9%, there was a slight improvement compared to the previous year (approx. 65%). With regard to nonconformities, it can be seen that minor non-conformities have decreased compared to last year (5.8%, previous year 12.4%). On the other hand, major non-conformities increased, from 2.6% in 2019 to 4.7% in 2020. Average non-compliances remained at the same level as the previous year, at around 23%.