Animal feed

Projet de décret relatif à la qualité et à la sécurité sanitaire des aliments pour animaux (Draft Decree on the quality and safety of animal feed). Language(s): French Number of pages: 20

The notified draft Decree is part of the implementation of Law No. 28-07 on food safety, enacted by Dahir No. 1.10.08 of 26 Safar 1431 (11 February 2010). It lays down the conditions and requirements to be met by feed for animals producing products for human consumption and provisions for the labelling of such feed.

The aim of the notified draft is to ensure that commercial animal feed does not pose a risk to animal health or cause harmful changes to food of animal origin consumed by humans, and that it does not pose a risk to human health, while complying with international standards for the labelling of feed.

Thus, the notified draft Decree:

-       sets out general and specific requirements for raw materials, additives and compound feeds;

-       lays down all obligatory labelling information, including nutrition declarations for the relevant animal species;

-       makes feed business operators responsible for taking all precautions to ensure that prohibited substances are not used in feed;

-       specifies that all labelling information must be in Arabic and possibly in one or more other languages, and that it must be understandable, visible, legible and indelible;

-       establishes the analytical constituents of compound feeds and the permitted tolerances;

-       lays down technical provisions on impurities, milk replacers, binding or denaturing feed materials, ash content and water content;

-       sets out the list of raw materials authorized by order of the Minister responsible for agriculture.

Lastly, it should be noted that the draft Decree establishes a transitional period for its entry into force of six months from its publication in the Official Journal to enable producers and importers to comply with its provisions and to allow animal feed placed on the market before its entry into force to be sold until stocks are exhausted.