Industrial obligations allied with French and European regulations are driving feedstuff manufacturers to assess the level of carry-over on their production lines. These technical rules, which are recognised by several certification reference systems, can also be applied to manufacturers of mineral and additive premixes.
These carry-overs consist of technically unavoidable traces of residual product in the production chain that may be transferred to follow-up batches during manufacture. They may also be referred to as “cross-contaminations” when this involves the transfer of contaminants. These technical rules are intended to provide a measurement tool that will facilitate technical mastery over such carry-overs and the presence of such traces.
These recommendations have been established on the basis of:
• settings known to impact on the results or their interpretation,
• the results of a bibliographical study on carry-overs between compound feeds,
• the results and observations obtained from industrial assessment campaigns carried out since 1999 jointly with the DGAL (French Directorate General on Food Safety).
Technical comments and rationales are provided in the form of cross-references at the end of this document, identified by numbered superscripts. Other comments and rationales are given in other technical datasheets (Nos 42, 45, 58, 78). Important concepts are underlined.
Compliance with these rules is a condition both for building a database on industrial performance in this area, and for enabling a comparison either between different sites or of a given site over a certain period of time.