WINNIPEG – Cargill Ltd. announced Nov. 18 it has recalled feed from about 100 Canadian farms because it may contain trace amounts of an ingredient banned to prevent the spread of BSE.
Canadian veterinary officials are trying to determine how many and what kind of cattle ate the feed, and whether the feed could have contained any infective material.
“The younger animals are the ones that we’ll be particularly interested in, if there were younger animals on these farms,” said Brian Evans of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.
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Cargill, the Canadian division of privately held U.S. agribusiness giant Cargill Inc., said it shipped a cattle feed ingredient between Oct. 31 and Nov. 14 in a rail car previously used to ship meat and bone meal made from cattle and other ruminant livestock.
The meat and bone meal can be used in hog and poultry feed, but has been banned from cattle feed since 1997 by Canada and the United States because of the risk of spreading BSE.
An estimated 400 to 500 tonnes of feed were affected in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, but Cargill did not know how much was eaten before the recall, said spokesperson Rob Meijer.
“What happened in terms of the cross-contamination is a no-no, and we are taking a very precautionary step here in a voluntary way and we’re cleaning it up,” Meijer said.
Canada has uncovered eight cases of BSE in its domestic herd since May 2003, and hopes to eliminate the disease within a decade by tightening its feed rules.
By July, cattle brains, spines and other material thought to create the most risk for spreading the disease will be banned from all types of animal feed. The materials have been kept out of human food since May 2003.
Young livestock are most susceptible to contracting the disease, which takes an average of four to seven years to incubate. By next week, the agency hopes to be able to assess the risk posed by the contaminated feed.
“If there is a determination that the potential is that these animals could incubate BSE and express BSE several years into the future, then that will be part of how we’ll work with the producers, to ensure that does not happen,” Evans said.
“It may or may not turn out to be a non-event, but we’re treating it with the type of diligence that we feel is appropriate to make sure that we are on a track to eradicate BSE as quickly as possible,” he said.
Investigators believe six of Canada’s eight diseased animals consumed tainted feed before or shortly after the introduction of the 1997 feed ban.
