9 Pet Food Safety Risks: What You Need to Know

Opportunities for microbial contamination exist throughout the pet food supply chain. For this reason, suppliers, renderers, pet food manufacturers and pet parents must work together to ensure the safety of pet foods. Below, we explore common incidences of microbial contamination in trending pet food formats.

How Does Microbial Degradation of Pet Food Affect Pets?

If a human consumed the microbes mentioned above, they may experience a minor or severe form of food poisoning. Pets may also present common severe food poisoning symptoms, like vomiting or diarrhea. But because pets eat the same meal every day, they can be chronically exposed to these microbes and their by-products which may present more minor, chronic symptoms such as gut health and skin and coat issues.

With significant microbial growth, pet parents will notice changes in pet food odor, texture and color. In most cases, pets experience these sensory changes before pet parents due to their heightened sense of smell. Off odors can cause pets to reject the food, refusing to eat or eating with less enthusiasm. This may impact brand loyalty and cause pet parents to switch pet foods with the assumption that their pet no longer likes their food.

How Pet Food Manufacturers and Renderers Can Protect Food Safety

A robust HACCP plan is critical to ensure operational and supply chain controls follow a systematic preventative approach for protecting from food safety hazards. Analyzing raw materials, regulating temperature and storage, properly sanitizing, ensuring packaging integrity and developing a recall plan are all measures that can help protect food safety. It’s also important for renderers and pet food manufacturers to follow strict process flows to ensure raw materials remain separate from finished goods. 

Kemin’s food safety products can ensure the quality of your ingredients and pet food by helping to  reduce risk of microbial growth in pet food formats, rendered products and raw materials. As a Kemin customer, our Technical Services and Customer Lab Services (CLS) can help you analyze product composition including pH, water activity, antimicrobial application rate, and appropriate shelf-life testing to ensure your product is protected.

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