Terra Canis, Birgitta Ornau
Food-grade pet food that appeals even to Birgitta Ornau, founder and managing director of Terra Canis.
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Dog food - Terra Canis

"Entirely new quality standards"

Terra Canis is one of the fastest growing pet food manufacturers to emerge in recent years. The editorial staff of PET worldwide spoke to company founder and managing director Birgitta Ornau about the concept and plans for the future.
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You were one of the first manufacturers to enter the market with your natural nutrition concept a few years ago. Now natural pet food has virtually become the standard. How do you stay a step ahead of your competitors?  

Terra Canis is the first dog and cat food in the European pet supplies trade to be manufactured using 100 per cent raw ingredients that are of proven food grade. You can pack inferior slaughterhouse waste and a large quantity of wheat into a tin - the protein source here isn't of high quality, nor is a large amount of wheat suitable for the canine species. Without any synthetic additives you can declare it to be "100 per cent natural", but that doesn't make it a good, species-specific food. In our eyes, therefore, "100 per cent natural" isn't really an advertising statement that stands by itself for quality and species-specific nutrition. 
What's special about our dog and cat food is that Terra Canis and Terra Faelis are the first products in the speciality trade that are produced in a butchery, a genuine food plant, demonstrably using 100 per cent raw ingredients of food grade. At the moment at which we process them in the butchery, the raw ingredients may be officially used also for the manufacture of products for human consumption/the food industry. 
Up to now, dog and cat food has and is being produced on a K3 basis (= material that in principle is not, or on account of a lack of freshness and hygiene is no longer, permitted for human consumption, even if it originated in the food sector at the time of slaughter)  in food factories. As first mover we have set entirely new quality standards in the sector with food grade, and more and more suppliers are attempting to follow suit.
"100 per cent natural" speaks for itself, but it isn't our key message, as it is not a guarantee of high-quality raw ingredients and a composition tailored to the species.To my knowledge there is perhaps a handful of companies - mostly smaller firms - which have taken over our quality concept and whose products have a quality that is genuinely comparable with ours. The question is: is it really always genuine food-grade material in the products, or is that just a marketing claim? As we have said, for us it means that the raw ingredients may also be used officially and legally at the point of processing into our menus for a sausage or a stew for human consumption. 

What proportion of sales does the export business account for?

The export quota is currently around 5 per…
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