Commitments
For safe, healthy and sustainable animal nutrition
Nutrition health and Feed safety
The sector provides animal nutrition and promotes animal health and welfare.Nutrition plays an active role in the health and well-being of livestock. A nutritionally balanced diet meets the animals’ essential needs for maintenance, reproduction, growth, and production (milk, eggs, meat).It helps strengthen animals’ immune defenses, limit the need for medication and the risk of antimicrobial resistance, and improve the nutritional quality of animal-derived products.To ensure product safety, companies in the sector adhere to strict sanitary regulations and monitor product quality on a daily basis.
AFCA-CIAL’s Initiatives
AFCA-CIAL spearheads several key initiatives to champion the nutritional solutions offered by its members. These include:
- Its involvement with OQUALIM (Association for the safety and quality of animal feed)—an association recognized for certifying animal nutrition plants under the RCNA standard (a proven certification for manufacturers of premixes, compound feeds, mineral feeds, milk replacers, and liquid feeds, as well as distributors of feeds and premixes) and for its shared self-monitoring programs, such as the “Supplements” plan (administered by AFCA-CIAL) for monitoring undesirable substances (dioxins, heavy metals, *Salmonella*).
- Giving a frame for the use of plant-based products in animal feed (extracts, essential oils, etc.) by publishing a unique reference guide applicable at both the French and European levels.
Publishing a good practice guide regarding the use of claims in animal nutrition.
Animal nutrition health and wellfare
Nutrition actively contributes to the health and well-being of farm animals.
Nutrition balanced in terms of nutritional elements covers the essential needs of animals and supports them during key periods such as, for example, the stress of weaning, or following calving/farrowing. It consolidates their defences and health, contributes to improving their well-being and participates in reducing the use of medicines and the risks of antibiotic resistance.
To defend the nutritional solutions offered by its members, AFCA-CIAL has conducted several key projects. Among these:
- Management of the use of plant-based products in animal feed (extracts, essential oils…) with the drafting of a single reference guide at the French and European levels.
- Drafting of a guide to good practices concerning the use of claims in animal feed.
The sustainability of animal sectors
Animal nutrition, as a link in the animal production chain, plays an essential role in industry sustainability. Taking into consideration environmental, social and economic issues when formulating feed contributes to making our breeding models sustainable.
Tangibly, sector players are involved in:
- Improving the production conditions through corporate social responsibility (CSR) approaches and life cycle analyses (LCA).
- Optimising the use of resources (mineral, phosphorus, by-products…) and reducing waste
AFCA-CIAL is a signatory to the DURALIM charter. It is the reference contact for the “additives, premixtures and supplements” sector in the DURALIM platform (Collaborative platform for the sustainable nutrition of livestock).
It encourages its members to commit to sustainable approaches. Through the actions of the European Federation for Compound Animal Feed (FEFAC), it is involved in reducing the impacts of animal industries on the environment.
