FDA Proposes Rules Regulating Brewers and Distillers Selling Spent Grains for Animal Feed
Brewers and distillers that sell spent grains to farmers
will want to stay tuned to the FDA’s Proposed
Rule for Current Good Manufacturing Practice and Hazard Analysis and Risk-Based
Preventative controls for Food for Animals over at regulations.gov.
The proposed rule will establish good manufacturing
practices for animal feed and require anyone falling within the sales threshold
(the rule currently proposes excepting companies with between $500k and $2.5
Million in sales) to establish many of
the same record keeping and safety plans already required or set to be required
under the Food Industry Modernization Act.
Whereas the preventative controls for human food proposed
some exemptions for alcoholic beverage productions, the discussion in this
proposal about animal food, for its Subpart C’s requirements for animal food
manufacturers to have a food safety plan, monitoring, corrective action plan
and hazard analysis is specifically found applicable to alcoholic beverage
manufacturers:
“Section 116 of FSMA applies to animal food. However, the
Agency is not aware of any animal food at alcoholic beverage facilities that
would be exempt from section 418 of the FD&C Act under the proposed
interpretation, and therefore is not aware of any animal food at alcoholic
beverage facilities that would be exempt from proposed subpart C, ‘Hazard
Analysis and Risk-Based Preventive Controls,’ for animal food. For example, FDA
understands that many breweries and distilleries sell spent grains, such as
brewers dried grains and distillers dried grains, as animal food. Because those
spent grains are not alcoholic beverages themselves, and they are not in a
prepackaged form that prevents any direct human contact with the food, the
Agency tentatively concludes that subpart C of this proposed rule would apply
to them.”
It’s worth keeping an eye on the proposed rule and the sales
exemptions to determine what procedures you may have to implement to deal with
your spent grains if you’re selling them for feed.
