Arizona sent 1 government employee to the August 2019 meeting. Arizona should not send any representatives to the January AAFCO meeting based on AAFCO ban of consumers.
Email addresses of Doug Ducey , Governor of Arizona, Mark Brnovich, Attorney General of Arizona, and AAFCO Board of Directors:
ServiceDesk@azdoa.gov, consumerinfo@azag.gov, geigerb@purdue.edu, kristen.mary.green@uky.edu, stan.cook@mda.mo.gov, akashani@agr.wa.gov, aafco@aafco.org, ebubb@pa.gov, davephillips@nd.gov, george.ferguson@ncagr.gov, atherrell@scda.sc.gov, hollis.glenn@state.co.us
Email content:
Dear Governor Ducey and Attorney General Brnovich,
I am writing to you requesting that Arizona Department of Agriculture immediately withdraw from participation in the Association of American Feed Control Officials (AAFCO) meeting to be held January 21-23, 2020 in Albuquerque, NM. State tax dollars are used to send multiple state employees to these meetings.
It is currently inappropriate for Arizona to use tax dollar funds to send representatives to this meeting; AAFCO has banned consumers and consumer stakeholder organizations from attending/participating in this meeting. Until AAFCO opens the meetings to consumers and consumer stakeholder organizations, allowing consumer input in pet food regulatory decisions – Arizona should not play a role in the consumer ban.
AAFCO charges Arizona Department of Agriculture representatives $400 (per person) to attend, AAFCO charges non-members $550.00 to attend meetings. Source: https://www.aafco.org/Portals/0/SiteContent/Meetings/Midyear/2020/2020_Midyear_Registration_Form.pdf?v20191101-2
The AAFCO website states “Anyone can register for and attend an AAFCO midyear or annual meeting.” Source: https://talkspetfood.aafco.org/roleofaafco However, multiple pet owners and pet owner stakeholder advocates received an email from AAFCO Board of Directors (cc’d on this email) stating “the AAFCO resources not accessible to you during this period include AAFCO meetings, the Feed BIN, AAFCO committees and work groups participation, and any other AAFCO resources not specifically identified here.”
AAFCO is a private organization, however its members are government employees who participate in the AAFCO process as representatives of government. Therefore, Arizona must immediately withdraw from participation in the upcoming AAFCO meeting based on unfounded bias shown by AAFCO against pet food consumers. If Arizona participates in this AAFCO meeting in any manner, Arizona would be condoning and/or endorsing AAFCO’s consumer ban – an attitude I would hope that Arizona does not want to project to its many pet food consumer residents.
(Your signature)
