Summary
Nutritional and dietary supplements - often named nutraceuticals as an amalgamation of the terms nutritional and pharmaceutical - have come a long way since a new trend in the care of companion animals emerged in the 1990s. This trend reflected a shift in the mindset of both veterinarians and animal owners: rather than relying purely on medicinal products for the prevention and treatment of diseases they started searching for nutritional and dietary alternatives. Consequently, disease management was increasingly perceived as health management, and the field of animal nutrition as such established itself as an important factor in the achievement and maintenance of the well-being of animals.
This trend followed a similar development in the human health sector, where the fast evolution of a new product category at the crossing point of two existing sectors - food and drugs - led to considerable confusion regarding its terminology and its legal status. Similarly, in the veterinary field, nutraceutical products are widely seen as non-drug substances, which are produced in a purified form and given orally to an animal in order to maintain or improve its health and well-being. However, the term nutraceuticals is not accepted on a global, regulatory or otherwise professional level, and in many parts of the world terms like dietary supplements appear more appropriate. Being neither food nor medicine but having properties of either of the two, nutraceuticals still fall into a grey area from a regulatory point of view. In most countries, regulation of products for human or animal consumption is divided into laws that deal with either medicines or foods, with nothing in the way of a compromise. While the situation in the human sector has been - more or less - clarified in recent years in regions such as North America and the EU, the development in the animal field is still behind in this respect.
In the human health sector in the US, the implementation of the 1994 Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act allows unprecedented claims to be made about how food or a dietary supplement affects the structure and/or function of the body. However, the US Food and Drug Administration has so far not accepted this act as applicable to animals. This is why the regulation of veterinary nutraceuticals continues to fall under the patchwork of 50 state feed laws. In Europe there is, as yet, no legislation available to accommodate the term nutraceuticals. A substance administered to animals must either be a food or a medicine, but nothing in-between. To date, there is no agreed EC Directive on food supplements for animals, although an according development has already been established in the human sector. This may well serve as a model for the veterinary field in the long run. In the meantime, it is still up to the Member States to implement their own legislation on claims within the constraints of prohibition in the EU Food Labelling Directive. The marketing of herbal supplemen ts is especially problematic in Europe, since the registration of herbal medicines involves the demonstration of quality, safety and efficacy, as with pharmaceuticals.
Commercially available nutraceutical products for animals include the traditional substa nces such as vitamins, minerals and amino acids, but also an increasing number of essential fatty acids, antioxidants, probiotics, enzymes, and herbs. However, the most successful products in economical terms to date are the joint health products. The chondroprotective agents, namely glucosamine and chondroitin sulphate, have experienced considerable success in the market place of products for use in dogs, cats and horses.
However, there has also been some controversy regarding their safety and efficacy and it has been repeatedly suggested that they should be classified as drugs
New nutraceutical products for use in animals are in development, which mostly are spin-offs from according research in the human field. Examples are fatty acid compounds for applications in the joint health sector, compounds derived from mushrooms and novel antioxidant substances. The development in the nutraceutical market sector has also had an impact on the pet food industry where manufacturers were able to identify a variety of substances that could be employed in order to add value to their existing product lines, or to develop new fortified food products.
The global market for nutraceuticals for companion animals was estimated in excess of $1 billion in 2006, while it completed the year 2005 just below that mark. Products for use in dogs reinforced their dominant position, approaching a 60% share of the total in 2005. More than half of total global revenues of this market were generated in North America, and nearly one third in Europe. Looking at product categories, the joint health preparations slightly lost ground due to the fact that a rapidly increasing number of competitors in that segment led to a certain price erosion. On the other hand, increasing research efforts combined with growing public acceptance appear to have caused considerable growth in the segment of herbal products.
There are generally three types of companies producing nutraceuticals for animals, the dedicated nutraceutical manufacturers including herbal specialists, the pet food companies, and the pharmaceutical manufacturers including both R&D-based and generic companies. All these different types of companies have their different angles to access the new segment of nutraceuticals for animals, as portrayed in the final chapter of the report in a number of examples. While in the early stages of this industry sector, nutraceuticals for animals were produced mainly by small-scale or niche manufacturers, both pharmaceutical and nutritional companies have had an entre in this segment, with varying success. Those that have managed to gain a stronghold in this market certainly have injected respectability, more vigorous competition and technical knowledge into it.
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