Source separated food organics can be used as animal food as livestock have the ability to eat plant materials or foodstuffs that humans cannot consume.

Food organics can either be processed or unprocessed depending upon the targeted animal group. As processing levels become more complicated, establishment costs, operating costs and the cost of the end product will also increase.

There are a number of health and quality issues that may impact upon the production and application of food organics materials as stock food. Perhaps most importantly there are issues with food born animal pathogens. In summary, the NSW Stock Foods Act, Stock Food Regulations and Stock Diseases Act requires that:

• NO tissue or blood from any animal or bird can be fed to pigs.
• NO food waste can be fed to pigs unless the material has been rendered or sterilised. This is due to the risk of potential transmission of foot and mouth disease and other viral diseases.
• NO meat products (including tissue, blood or feathers) can be fed to ruminants (cattle, sheep, goats, deer etc.). This is due to the risk of bovine spongiform encephalophathy (BSE) also known as Mad Cow Disease.

These laws aim to prevent the development and/or spread of several serious animal diseases including BSE (Mad Cow Disease) and foot and mouth disease.

More information can be found in the report 'Food Organics Processing Options for New South Wales' available free to download.

NSW Agriculture also has a number of Agnotes that cover these issues:

• Agnote DAI-181: Dangers in feeding waste material to livestock
• Agnote DAI-227: Feed controls - stopping BSE (Mad Cow Disease)