AAFCO Verification Program for a Voluntary

Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) Plan

October 3, 2008

Introduction:

The 2005 – 2009 AAFCO strategic plan calls for the development of a proactive, preventative feed safety program. To fulfill this endeavor, in October 2007 the AAFCO Board of Directors (BOD) established a taskforce that would draw upon feed safety experts from the feed industry, FDA, state inspection programs and academia.

The AAFCO HACCP Taskforce was tasked: (1) to draft a HACCP standard for feed that will enable uniform adoption and provide a basis for equivalency and (2) to create an auditing system to verify conformance of a firm’s HACCP plans against the AAFCO standard.

After nearly one year of collaboration, the AAFCO HACCP Taskforce has completed a draft of the “AAFCO Verification Program for a Voluntary HACCP Plan” that is ready for public review and comment. Regulatory agencies, feed industry representatives, and other interested parties are encouraged to review the plan and to submit comments to AAFCO by November 26, 2008.

Please note: The comment period has passed and the document is currently being revised by the Taskforce in response to the comments received. After making the revisions, the Taskforce will submit the final draft to the AAFCO Board of Directors who plan to send it to a committee for their review. At this time, the committee will receive the final comments and make a recommendation to the board at their earliest convenience. It is anticipated that the revised document will be available shortly after the Midyear Meeting at which time AAFCO will accept additional comments.

The taskforce will compile and evaluate all comments; make final revisions to the document; and submit the revised document to the AAFCO BOD prior to the midyear meeting in January 2009. If accepted by the AAFCO BOD, the BOD will forward the proposeddocument to the appropriate AAFCO Committee(s) for discussion in an open committee forum. The BOD will consider the committee(s) recommendation and will proceed as outlined in the AAFCO By-laws.

Please keep in mind, the draft document is part of a comprehensive HACCP system that ultimately requires the support of trained inspectors and managers to fully implement.  At this time, AAFCO is not endorsing a specific HACCP, ISO or other quality assurance program.  AAFCO is however, awaiting guidance on an anticipated FDA program.

The AAFCO BOD would like to recognize the AAFCO HACCP Taskforce for their time and effort in promoting feed safety.

Would you like to see all the comments submitted for this document?  Click HERE.