November 3, 2009

Consumers Union and Chicago-based Food Animals Concern Trust (FACT) have presented a petition to the US Food and Drug Administration asking the agency to ban the practice of feeding poultry waste to cattle.

Poultry litter comprise of feces, sawdust, feathers, spilled feed and anything else that may accumulate on the floor of a chicken or turkey coop. The byproduct is then added to livestock feed because it has nutritional value and is cheap.

The FDA estimates that cattle are fed between one and two million tonnes of poultry litter annually, which is a legal and common practice.

Poultry litter can contain disease-causing bacteria, antibiotics, toxic heavy metals, restricted feed ingredients including meat and bonemeal from dead cattle, and foreign objects such as dead rodents, rocks, nails and glass, said Consumers Union.

The consumers groups believe feeding poultry litter to cattle presents a serious risk to human and animal health.

The resulting health threats include the spread of mad cow disease and related human neurological diseases, the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria, and the potential for exposure to toxic metals, drug residues, and disease-causing bacteria, said Consumers Union.

The FDA must step in and ban poultry litter as cattle feed once and for all, as cows deserve better than toxic leftovers, said Richard Wood, FACT's executive director.

Eleven national organisations endorsed the petition, including the Centre for Science in the Public Interest and McDonald's Corp.

But the National Cattlemen's Beef Association said the ban is not necessary as science does not justify the ban, and that the FDA has looked at the issue many times before.

The FDA has until November 11, 2009 to respond to the petition, which has been signed by 37,000 people.