Not in Fido's Food Either Posted
by Reggie at 04/06/07 05:07 PM
With the revelation that the Chinese company that supplied wheat gluten suspected of contaminating pet food may have shipped wheat gluten to the US for human consumption too, its clear that our pets are the canaries in the coal mine. Human food safety is also at risk. (The importer insists its product went only into pet food, but this has not been substantiated by FDA.)
According to the AP, FDA only inspects 1.3% of food imports, and inspections today are only 75% of what they were in 2003. You can protect yourself somewhat by buying locally or organic but we really need an effective federal watchdog in this era of global food supplies. Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) would help if there is a contaminant in human food, but Congress has delayed COOL numerous times. Even after all our problems this year with spinach, peanut butter, tomatoes and imported melons, and now pet food, the FDA did not request a budget for next year that accounts for inflation. We need COOL, and a stronger, much better funded federal food safety system.
comments
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Posted by GreenChick at 05/02/07 01:51 PM
Thanks for all the great information. I can’t believe how much disinformation is out there about pet nutrition. There’s so much artificial flavoring and chemicals in our packaged pet foods. I think it’s interesting that we aren’t even feeding our pets the foods they were born to eat. The diet of the average American pet is no where close to what these animals eat in the wild. I recently wrote a post about all-natural cat and dog food. I thought you pet lovers out their might be interested. Most generic pet foods on the market are primarily carbohydrates but cats and dogs are carnivores. You can read more at: http://thisgreenlife.wordpress.com/2007/04/26/a-healthy-diet/
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Posted by op at 07/05/07 05:09 PM
agreed we need a better system as everybody is jumping on the walmart bandwagon having found out what suckers americans are for cheap products, sadly it only takes a little more to get a quality product... and when buying cheap products remember most of the monies are going into the pockets of an importer who would sell you rat posion if he though he could do so without reprecussion.
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Posted by Edith at 07/18/08 01:56 AM
yes, pets do need specific attention. Nowadays food gets shipped over from around the world. Dates on packaging are forged. Just for information i ran a quick information check across some good packaging firms and it came to my attention that the freshness of food in pouches is a significant issue and i was completely unaware of it. I still wonder what i made my pet eat.
@greenchick i agree the diet is no where near as close as what these animals would eat in the wild.
i just hope that i get the right thing for my pet and hope that you do to.
