FDA Virtual Listening Session on the Oversight of Pet Food
Date: September 24, 2021, 1:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. ET
Organized by: Center for Veterinary Medicine
On This Page:
- Background
- Listening Session Information
- Registration
- Requests for Oral Presentations
- Submitting Electronic or Written Comments
- Recording and Transcript
Stakeholder engagement is a priority at FDA. As part of FDA’s ongoing efforts to facilitate communication with stakeholders and receive information related to its regulatory activities, FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) will host a virtual listening session on Friday, September 24, 2021, on the Agency’s oversight of pet food. The listening session will provide an opportunity for stakeholders to share information and insight on this topic with FDA.
Background
FDA regulates the ingredients, manufacturing and labeling of pet food, including treats. Pet food can be for a variety of companion species such as dogs, cats, birds, gerbils, hamsters, snakes and lizards.
There is no requirement that pet food products have pre-market approval by the FDA. However, the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act) requires that food for animals, like food for humans, is safe to eat, produced under sanitary conditions, free of harmful substances, and truthfully labeled.
When necessary to protect animal or human health, FDA takes appropriate regulatory and enforcement action. Information about FDA’s oversight of pet food can be found on FDA-CVM’s website at: FDA's Regulation of Pet Food.
Listening Session Information
The virtual listening session is an opportunity for stakeholders – consumers, industry, interest groups, academia, and others – to share information and feedback that they feel is relevant to FDA’s oversight of pet food. The Agency would like to gather information and better understand various perspectives on topics such as the FDA’s oversight of pet food labeling, ingredients, contaminants, and safety to help inform resource allocation and any potential future policy development process.
Final Agenda - FDA Virtual Listening Session on the Oversight of Pet Food
Registration
As of September 14, registration for the listening session is full. After the event takes place, FDA will post a recording on this web page. If you have comments about the regulation of pet food that you want to share with the FDA, please submit them to the docket (FDA-2021-N-0859) via https://www.regulations.gov by October 25, 2021.
Requests for Oral Presentations
On the registration form, you may indicate if you wish to make an oral presentation during the listening session. We will do our best to accommodate all requests to make oral presentations. Individuals and organizations with common interests are urged to consolidate or coordinate their presentations, and request time for a joint presentation, or submit requests for designated representatives to participate. All requests to make oral presentations must have been received by September 3, 2021 at 11:59 p.m. ET.
Based on the number of presentation requests, we will determine the amount of time allotted to each presenter and the approximate time each oral presentation is to begin, and we will notify participants shortly after September 3rd, including instructions and a deadline for submitting presentation materials.
Submitting Electronic or Written Comments
Electronic or written comments on this listening session must be submitted by Monday, October 25, 2021.
To electronically submit comments to the docket, visit https://www.regulations.gov and type FDA-2021-N-0859 in the search box. For assistance in submitting electronic comments, please see regulations.gov/help. Comments submitted electronically, including attachments, to https://www.regulations.gov will be posted to the docket unchanged. Because your comment will be made public, you are solely responsible for ensuring that your comment does not include any confidential information that you or a third party may not wish to be posted, such as medical information, your or anyone else’s Social Security number, or confidential business information, such as a manufacturing process. Please note that if you include your name, contact information, or other information that identifies you in the body of your comments, that information will be posted on https://www.regulations.gov.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Dockets Management Staff is receiving USPS mail intermittently. Therefore, electronic submissions are preferred. To submit comments to the docket by mail, use the following address: Dockets Management Staff (HFA-305), Food and Drug Administration, 5630 Fishers Lane, Rm. 1061, Rockville, MD 20852. Be sure to include docket number FDA-2021-N-0859 on each page of your written comments. Comments received by mail will be considered timely if they are postmarked on or before October 25, 2021. They will be placed in the docket and, except for those submitted as "Confidential Submissions," will be publicly viewable at https://www.regulations.gov.
To submit a comment with confidential information that you do not wish to be made publicly available, submit your comments only as a written/paper submission. You should submit two copies total. One copy will include the information you claim to be confidential with a heading or cover note that states “THIS DOCUMENT CONTAINS CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION.” The Agency will review this copy, including the claimed confidential information, in its consideration of comments. The second copy, which will have the claimed confidential information redacted/blacked out, will be available for public viewing and posted on https://www.regulations.gov. Submit both copies to the Dockets Management Staff. If you do not wish your name and contact information to be made publicly available, you can provide this information on the cover sheet and not in the body of your comments and you must identify this information as “confidential.” Any information marked as “confidential” will not be disclosed except in accordance with 21 CFR 10.20 and other applicable disclosure law. For more information about FDA's posting of comments to public dockets, see 80 FR 56469, September 18, 2015.
For access to the docket to read the electronic and written/paper comments received, go to https://www.regulations.gov and insert the docket number, FDA-2021-N-0859, into the “Search” box and follow the prompts.
Recording and Transcript