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M.J.M. Tielen

of GM plants and EU approvals, the EU has so far been unable to come forward with a practical proposal to allow trade to continue. As a result we have almost lost the entire supply of Corn gluten feed. Unless a „miracle“ happens over the next two years we may risk losing the vital supply of soybean meal from South America, should the second generation of GM soybean events be authorised and grown in key export markets before their approval in the EU.

CONCLUSIONS

The European Feed Industry produces 142 million tons of compound feed yearly to produce food of animal origin. Some feed incidents in the past like the MPA - crisis focused the activities of the feed industry towards the assurance of feed safety. Imple-mentation of HACCP in the feed mills and monitoring the production process created elear information about the risks and the opportunities to minimize the feed safety risks. Salmonella monitoring for instance demonstrates this opportunity very elear.

Feed safety is an essential part of food safety. Feed and food business operators have to recognise their shared responsibility and overcome mistrust among partners in the chain. In the feed sector, there is an ongoing implementation of codes of practice but still a lack of harmonisation of traceability systems also. Therefore, FEFAC has deve-loped the European Feed Manufacturers Codę linked with an International Feed Ingre-dient Standard to ensure feed safety, for which an effective traceability system tracing back the Quality Assurance systems all along the feed chain is crucial.

In the last years morę attention is given on sustainability. The feed industry is hea-vily involved in the sustainability of soy production. The objective of the RTRS initia-tive is to achieve a certification system for the global soy production to assure responsi-ble soy production.

As soon as Genetically Modified (GM)-products are authorised by European gov-ernmental body's safety is not longer an issue in the use of GM-products for compound feed production. Labelling of GM from feed to food should assure a traceable and transparent tool to inform the consumer about the GM status of the food.

REFERENCES

European Union, 2001. White paper on Food Safety, COM 719/1999, Official Journal of the European Union, OJ C, 197-203.

European Union, 2002. General Food Law, (EC) 178/2002, Official Journal of the European Union, OJ L, 31, 1.

European Union, 2005. Feed Hygiene Regulation , (EC) 183/2005, Official Journal of the European Union, OJ L, 35, 1.

Once adopted, Feed Hygiene Regulation became the legał reference of the FEFAC Action plan for feed safety.

Federation Europeenne des Fabricants d’Aliments Composes ( FEFAC), 2007. Feed & Food Statistical Yearbook. Available atl: http://www.fefac.org/statistics.aspx

Federation Europeenne des Fabricants d’Aliments Composes ( FEFAC), 2008. The European Feed Manufacturers Guide ( EFMC ) and the IFSA-Feed Ingredient Standard ( IFIS). Avai-lable at: http://www.fefac.org

Acta Sci. Pol.