The use of USDA human-grade ingredients guarantees that your pet will never be exposed to the kinds of low-quality ingredients of questionable nutritional quality and origin that are all too often used by conventional pet food manufacturers to increase their profit/cost ratio.
The feed-grade ingredients most commonly used by conventional pet food manufacturers include very low-quality components, such as meat byproducts, which cannot be traced to their original animal sources. In cases where pet food manufacturers defend the use of meat byproducts with the argument that dogs and cats in the wild commonly and arbitrarily eat the remains of a variety of animals, just keep in mind that it's not the over-medicated and continuously stressed animals in overcrowded feed lots or chicken batteries that are being stalked, killed, and eaten, but rather free-living wild prey. As a pet owner, you need to educate yourself about what the terms 'byproducts,' 'animal meals' and 'rendered fats', actually refer to. In many cases, these are blanket terms that may refer to various animal parts, some obtained under distressing circumstances. For example, would you be surprised to know that this kind of terminology often refers to the carcasses of euthanized animals containing the toxins used to put them down or animals discarded after lab experimentation? Well, don't be shocked; this is all too often the case. And here's another shock: the USDA and FDA are aware of this and fully disclose unbiased information about these unsettling components online.
What about the sourcing of ingredients? Often, untraceable ingredients include so-called 'animal meals,' animal fat,' and 'animal protein,' which may contain mixtures of fats and proteins from a variety of unidentified animal species, or vegetable oil, which may contain mixtures of oils from a variety of undefined plant sources. Should your pet experience a food-related health problem, there wouldn't be a way to trace any undefined pet food components back to their precise source; big, big trouble, and not just for your pet, but for every other pet that's been eating the same pet food.
Another important point to touch on is the inferior nutrition and poor treatment of most animals raised for food. Now, I believe that it is highly unethical to abuse and treat inhumanely any animal that is raised for food, whether for humans or the animals we choose to keep as pets. But apart from any ethical issues and taking a purely pragmatic point of view, it is undeniable that animals raised and treated inhumanely are severely stressed; high stress levels induce the release of various hormones and other compounds that likely negative impact the nutritional quality of the meat; and, finally, your pet receives food containing meat of an inferior quality. So, although USDA inspections are increasingly rare due to this agency's ridiculously low budget and reduced manpower, both the threat of fines and the possibility of inspections provide at least some incentive for pet food manufacturers to treat animals according to the rules established by U.S. law.
Although the use of USDA human-grade ingredients doesn't, by itself, guarantee that a given pet food is healthy, it does eliminate some of the important unknowns, examples of which I've just described. Nevertheless, you should be aware that USDA certified, human-grade, pet food ingredients might include such questionable ingredients as residual agricultural chemicals, hormones, antibiotics, genetically modified organisms (GMOs), sugars, artificial sweeteners, refined salt or flours, low-grade synthetic supplements, and isolated 'food fragments' like gluten (which, by the way, neither animals nor people should consume in any great quantity).
The standards for quality and provenance of human-grade pet foods are only reliable when they have been verified by unbiased third parties. In the case of USDA organic certification, each ingredient used in the manufacture of a given pet food is inspected and its quality is checked against both the manufacturer's list of ingredients and any claims presented on the product label. Ingredients used for USDA certified organic pet foods cannot legally contain GMOs, antibiotics, or exogenous hormones. The granting of USDA organic certification requires complete disclosure of ingredients used, as well as their sources, and verifies that USDA human-grade, and not feed grade, ingredients are contained in a given product where such claim is made.
So, to summarize, the best USDA human-grade pet food happens to be USDA certified organic, i.e., pet food made with ingredients that are not only USDA human-grade, but are also generally healthy for your pet, whether a dog, a cat, or any other animal. The pet food in question should never contain refined ingredients or known allergens. Low-grade or even human-grade synthetic supplements are simply not good choices for inclusion in your animal's diet. If you don't see any evidence to substantiate a manufacturer's claim, simply ask them for evidence-such as third-party organic certification-that their claim is actually true. If they can't provide evidence, then just look elsewhere for a reliable source for your animal's food. Remember: you-not a pet food manufacturer-are the only reliable guardian of your pet and his or her good health and happiness!
Dr. Heidi Junger is a Ph.D. zoologist, who recently started her own organic pet food manufacturing company in San Diego, California. Please visit http://www.onestaorganics.com for more information.
