Pet Food Politics: The Chihuahua in the Coal Mine Book

Pet Food Politics is, on one level, the story of the 2007 pet food scandal in which adulterated pet food killed hundreds of dogs and cats in the United States and Canada. But this story has far reaching implications for the safety of our food supply in an era of globalized trade.

The culprit in 2007 was melamine, a waste by-product of plastic making which was substituted for wheat gluten and rice protein by Chinese suppliers of protein sources for pet foods. Melamine is a non-protein source of nitrogen, and hence can be used to boost nitrogen content, giving a false and inflated protein content. The melamine was added purposely by the Chinese suppliers for that reason. They then evaded inspection of large quantities of their product by exporting it as silk scarves. Melamine, ordinarily of fairly low toxicity, combined with another contaminant in the fraudulent "gluten" to form crystals. These resulted in kidney problems and death in hundreds (possibly thousands) of pets.

Pet Food Politics explains how the pet food business works, and how the melamine contaminated "gluten" ended up in dozens of different brands of pet food. As well, it details the difficulty of determining the sources of Chinese products, inspecting Chinese production facilities, and enforcing safety regulations. It also reveals how impotent and underfunded the FDA is, and how the melamine in pet food found its way into the human food chain in the United States. The implications for the safety of the human food chain are obvious and ominous.

The chihuahua in the coalmine is the food equivalent of the canary in the coalmine -- the proverbial early warning sign. Pet Food Politics raises a red flag, and warns that we ignore the chihuahua's warning at our own peril. This book is informative and a must read for anyone interested in food safety in the age of global trading.