G.A.R.D.Howling mad!
Hi, Cocopuff here again. As you may have
gathered, I'm howling mad about what they're doing to our dog food! By
"they" I mean specifically, but not exclusively, Chinese manufacturers.
Lately we've been hearing about recall after recall and, while it's good that
they are recalling defective, dangerous products, this is usually after
incidents of sickness or death have been reported. This is scary and
entirely unnecessary. I have nothing against the Chinese people, but I
think that as the Chinese nation struggles to advance its stature in the world
community it is bypassing some key elements that would normally prevent greed
and avarice from becoming major influences in their commercial
enterprises. The latest debacle of poisoned infant formula (for their own
consumption) really underscores the extent of the problem. If the formula
manufacturers and milk producers are not above adding the toxic compound
Melamine to artificially enhance the apparent protein content of their product,
I would tend to suspect that they have a problem with integrity as well as the
necessary oversight and regulation to ensure that integrity prevails. I
really don't trust them to make my dog food while they're poisoning their own
babies in order to increase their cash flow!
What can you do? Well, the first thing is to know what you're buying. I know Dad's first reaction was to stop buying me any food, chewies or treats that were made in China but, unfortunately, it gets more complicated than that. A number of manufacturers that produce food for distribution under a whole range of brands and prices use ingredients imported from China, so just going out and finding the priciest dog food and checking the label provides little or no protection. With a little work and a little Googling, its easy enough to research a particular brand and get a sense how it is manufactured and from what. There's way too much information to include here and we will refrain from endorsing any specific product or manufacturer here but you owe it to yourself and your beloved pet to come up to speed in how safe your pet's food is.
Secondly, the only way things are ever going to change is to stop buying these substandard, potentially lethal products and put manufacturers and retailers on notice that this is what you are doing and encouraging others to do. As long as we keep buying it, they'll keep making it and poisoning our pets while they line their pockets at the expense of our tears. Dad helped me compose an open letter (it's supposed to be written from a human's perspective) that you can sign and distribute to anyone in the pet food supply chain to express your concern and intentions. A link has been provided here so that you can download this letter to your own printer, e-mail or whatever. Please feel free to print some out for your friends and co-workers or send it to them via the web either by e-mailing it or sending them the link to this page.
Another step you can take to help protect your pet is to stay abreast of food safety issues as they are identified. Rather than waiting to hear it on the news, we would recommend going to www.fda.gov and signing up for e-mail notification of pending and current recalls. This will, at least, give you as much advance warning as is currently possible.
Lastly, if we will ever be able to buy a bag of dog (or cat) food without wondering if it's the last one we'll need, we need to be true to our ideals. Times are tough and money is tight but ask yourself if you are willing to jeopardize your pet's health and safety to maybe save a couple of dollars. If these inferior products start collecting dust on store shelves, the industry will have to change and once again get to the business of supplying us with safe, trustworthy pet supplies. Good luck!
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