28 March 2017
Dr. John Gilbert, FoodLife International Ltd (Turkey)

Officilas meeting in China

A hugely successful MyToolBox meeting took place on March 28th 2017 in Beijing between officials from the Ministry of Agriculture (MOU) in China, the European Commission and partners from MyToolBox to discuss approaches to standard setting for mycotoxin detoxification additives. Frans Verstrate (DG Sante) in a short presentation explained the risk assessment and risk management processes in the EU for feed additives. The EU approach for demonstrating efficacy of additives with animal feeding studies was outlined using the EFSA protocol. Rudi Krska gave an overview of the MyToolBox project and in particular the proposed collaboration with CASS Feed Research Institute to conduct animal studies with dairy cows using aflatoxin B1 adsorbent additives and with pigs using fumonisin detoxification enzymes.  From the China side Zhang Xiaoyu from the Division of Feed Administration (MOU) presented the current approach to regulating feed additives and described a shortly to be completed 5-year project on mycotoxin detoxification additives. After a fruitful discussion and exchange of views it was concluded that much could be learnt by EU and China officials concerning the different regulatory approaches and the goal should be mutual recognition of the processes used for testing the efficacy of feed additives. It is hoped that this meeting will be the first of further meetings as MyToolBox project continues with practical experimental work conducted in China comparing the performance of feed additives.