Near Perfect Compliance on Feed Ban

August 6, 2004 -- The American Meat Institute reported this week that the Food and Drug Administration?s (FDA) most recent update showed that rendering and feed industries continue to achieve a near perfect score ? 99 percent -- with guidelines laid down by the government for enforcing feed production and the feeding of mammalian protein to ruminants.

The ruminant feed ban became effective on Aug. 4, 1997, and is considered an important firewall in combating BSE in the United States.

All inspections are classified into three categories: Official Action Indicated (OAI), Volunteer Action Indicated (VAI) and No Action Indicated (NAI). Of the 2,901 feed industries inspected, 17 firms received an OAI rating (less than 1 percent of the total) and 86 received a VAI rating (3 percent of the total).

A total of 161 renderer inspections revealed that zero firms were classified as OAI and 4 firms (2.5 percent of the total) were classified as VAI.

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