The Australian feed milling industry has appealed to grain growers to be more attentive to quality assurance (QA) to guarantee contamination problems don't endanger the feed supply chain.
At the Australasian Milling Conference (AMC) held on the Gold Coast, Queensland last week, John Spragg, Stock Feed Manufacturers Council of Australia's (SFMCA) CEO, stated grain contamination issues remained one of the most important and greatest threats concerning the feed milling industry.
Sprag said, "We would love to see more on-farm quality assurance in the grains industry, particularly relating to risk of chemical residues with grain storage fumigants,". "We see that quality controls have a role to play in reducing the potential risk."
"It only takes one producer to do the wrong thing and it spreads across the whole industry," he continued.
"With resistance issues, the temptation might be for a producer to use something that is not registered or above registration rates, or supply without sticking to the withholding periods."
The SFMCA CEO went on to explain that contaminated grain was detected through the national residue surveys and could promptly be followed back to the source farm.
"Our members buy grains that go into the survey system, so it will either be picked up in the grain that is analysed or it could be picked up in milk, meat or eggs that have been tested,"
"In each of those cases, there is traceability back to the original source, so it is important for grain growers to make sure they are doing the right thing.", Sprag said.
The Australian feed milling industry continued to develop, especially spurred on by the dairy and poultry industries, Mr Sprag said.
In Queensland, the greatest demand was from the beef cattle, feedlot and supplemental feeding sections.
Mr Sparg continued, "We have a lot more capital investment in manufacturing capacity and types of equipment, and there has been a move to pelleted feeds and heat steam processing,"
"There is less home mixing and more commercial feeds, particularly with pigs and poultry."
The Australasian Milling Conference (AMC) is the leading conference for feed and flour millers and is held biannually in Australia. The next conference is planned for 2014.
