A panel of experts convened in December 2011 predicted the price of corn and other commodity ingredients would moderate this year after record-setting price hikes last year. Though these experts are part of the poultry industry, their predictions might hold insights (and good news) for petfood manufacturers, too.

To help US food, feed and petfood producers be prepared to meet new regulations under the Food Safety Modernization Act and prevent foodborne illnesses, the US Food and Drug Administration has announced a new Food Safety Preventive Controls Alliance. Forged from a partnership with the Illinois Institute of Technology's Institute for Food Safety and Health, the alliance's mission is to develop training courses and materials aimed at preventing contamination of human and animal food during production, FDA says.

Petfood sales continue to grow at a modest pace, accompanied by anemic volume growth. Data available as of the beginning of December show global petfood sales have increased 4% this year, according to the folks at Euromonitor International, who generously provided year-to-date figures along with comparisons to 2010.

While humanization has definitely been a good thing for the petfood industry, it has its downsides, too. One negative for pets, arguably, is that as the human population goes, at least in developed markets, so goes the pet overpopulation. Specifically for food, that means the percentage of overweight or obese pets is increasing at a pace similar to the rise of obesity in humans.

As further proof that pet ownership continues to increase and fuel the growth of petfood markets globally, a new website for dog lovers in India has launched. DogZone.in bills itself as India's first online community of dog lovers.

A new report from Cascadia Capital, an independent investment bank that includes petfood and other pet product companies among its investments and transactions, shows the pet industry is "gaining momentum" coming out of the recession, not only in sales but also in merger & acquisition transactions and new companies emerging.

In its most literal sense, the term "humanization" means to take a non-human creature or object and try to make it human. "To portray or endow with human characteristics or attributes" is the first definition on TheFreeDictionary.com.

Nestlé, parent company of Nestlé Purina PetCare, ranks among the top 11 companies worldwide for corporate sustainability practices. So says Two Tomorrows, which bills itself as an international corporate sustainability agency, in its recently released Tomorrow's Value Rating.

A recent study by Kevin Haninger and James Hammitt of the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis shows US consumers would be willing to spend US$4,500-6,000 to prevent each case of short-term illness caused by contaminated food. Reported in the October edition of FSMeDigest from Food Safety Magazine, the study started with the seemingly simple goal of examining the "monetary value that consumers place on a safer food supply," the authors wrote.

The US Food and Drug Administration is working hard -- and partnering with both the human food and petfood industries -- to meet deadlines and develop regulations and policies in adherence to the Food Safety Modernization Act, signed into law in January 2011. The new regulations and rules will include ones encompassing petfood, some for the first time, and the law's deadlines mean many will go into effect within the next year or so.