EFIP calls for harmonised EU feed safety assurance

Jans added: “In this sense, mutual recognition of schemes with comparable design and objectives remain a necessity for well functioning markets and for enhancing cost efficiency for operators.”

 

EFIP members have developed EU harmonised feed safety management systems (Codes) based on European Guides, endorsed by the European Commission.

 

They contain the requirements for a management system, prerequisite programmes and hazard analysis, including risk assessments developed by feed experts.

 

In addition, a third party certification system has been developed to make sure that the system will be uniformed and consistently applied by the operators in the EU and elsewhere.

 

Such a harmonized approach strengthens the feed safety situation for the EU livestock industry, the feed chain and ultimately increases the confidence of the consumer in the EU 27.

 

“The collective knowledge of our sectors has been condensed in the EFIP feed ingredient safety schemes. This ongoing process results in increased awareness, ownership and motivation by the operator. This leads to improved and uniform implementation of the EU legislative feed safety requirements,” Jans said.

 

Furthermore, EFIP standards facilitate trade in the feed chain, providing a passport to trade, from one country to the next, in the EU internal market and between third countries and the EU.

 

By trading or purchasing ingredients from a certified feed business operator, the operators know that they are dealing with trustful partners who have put in place the required systems for supporting the safety of their products.

 

“Basis of such harmonised approach should be the benchmarking and mutual recognition between the different feed safety management systems,” Jans explains.

 

Mutual recognitions with feed schemes down the value chain are generally progressing well and the schemes gathered under EFIP (i.e. GTP, EFISC and FAMI-QS) have gathered a number of such agreements all over Europe.

 

“This is a very welcome development that contributes to reducing the fragmentation among the systems, while respecting the legitimate expectation of each industry sector to take care for its own role in feed chain safety,” Jans says.

 

“It must be realised that all feed safety management systems want to achieve the same goal, namely – supply our customers in the feed chain with safe feed that is produced under controlled production conditions and in line with legal requirements”, Jans said.

 

“Competition between the different feed safety systems should not be a blocking factor in the negotiations for benchmarking and mutual recognition. Therefore these undertakings must be sustained and supported by all parties in the feed chain,” he concluded.

 

The European Feed Ingredients Platform (EFIP) is a voluntary platform of the major European feed ingredients associations.

 

EFIP’s members aim at reaching an EU wide harmonized understanding and implementation of the EU feed hygiene regulation.

 

Together, different sectors and their companies share their experience, cooperate and offer concerted guidance to their members and other stakeholders on the shared, non-competitive issue of feed safety.