Whether the agricultural feed cooperative manufacturing operation has to register depends on
whether the operation meets one of the exemptions in 21 CFR 1.226, such as being a farm.
Example 1: A cooperative consists of member farms that own and manage a feed mill, and the
feed mill sells animal food to the member farms and other non-member farms. The cooperative
feed mill would not meet the “retail food establishment” exemption because it is selling to farms
(businesses) rather than to consumers. It would not meet the definition of a “farm” because the
manufactured/processed food is not consumed on farms under the same management, since the
feed mill is not under one management with the various individual farms that are purchasing the
animal food from the feed mill. The feed mill would be required to register
Example 2: A cooperative manages a feed mill and also manages an operation in the same
general (but not necessarily contiguous) physical location as the feed mill, devoted to raising
animals that are eating all the food produced by the feed mill. The feed mill does not sell the
manufactured/processed food to any other buyers. The operation managed by the cooperative
would meet the definition of a “farm” in 21 CFR 1.227 and the feed mill that is part of that
operation would not be required to register.
