Additives 添加剂

 

Additives in pet food serve various purposes: The first one is to provide nutritional benefits, e.g. vitamins. The second purpose concerns technological additives for safety and maintaining the desirable features of texture, stability and resistance to spoilage and lastly there can be sensory additives providing the colour and flavour.

添加剂在宠物食品中有多种用途：第一个是提供营养，例如维生素。第二个用途是技术型方面的，如：保证产品安全性、保持理想的质地、保持状态稳定和防腐，最后是改善感官的添加剂，比如提供颜色和风味。

 

The term ‘additive’ can be applied to a range of ingredients that manufacturers add to the basic ingredients that are at the heart of pet food. These minor ingredients include mainly essential nutrients such as vitamins and minerals, but also flavours, colours and agents to prevent harmful spoilage of the pet food due to fats going rancid or through bacterial contamination.

“additive”一词也可用来表示一堆预混料，这些预混料是宠物食品的核心原料。这些微量的原料主要包括必需营养素（如维生素和矿物质），也包括风味剂、色素和能防止宠物食品因为脂肪氧化酸败或细菌污染变质的物质。

 

Vitamins and minerals are presented in the factsheet ‘Nutritional needs of Cats and Dogs’.

维他命和矿物质的内容记载于“猫狗的营养需要”的资料页。

 

Preservatives 防腐剂

 

Pet food safety is of critical importance. Preservatives may be added, largely depending upon the type of pet food product and processing, to ensure that food products remain nutritious and safe for consumption throughout their shelf life. The food must be protected from bacterial or mould contamination and spoilage, further it must be protected from degradation and the loss of nutrients during storage. The method of preservation used depends on the type of food because the way of processing also contributes to the food integrity and shelf life:

宠物食品的安全至关重要。可能会添加防腐剂，确保食品在整个货架期内仍保持营养和安全，是否添加主要取决于宠物食品产品的类型和加工方式。食品的保存方法取决于食品的种类，因为加工的方式也有助于延长保质期:

 

Dry pet food: The manufacturing process kills microbes and the low moisture content helps to inhibit the growth of most organisms.

干性宠物食品：生产过程杀死微生物，低水分含量有助于抑制大多数微生物的生长。

 

Moist pet food: The heat applied in cooking of canned or pouch pet food kill microbes and the packaging excludes air, protecting the food.

湿性宠物食品：罐装或袋装的湿粮经过热处理杀菌以及真空排气来保护食品。

 

Chilled pet food: Processed chilled pet food has undergone a controlled thermal process and this, together with refrigeration during storage helps suppress spoilage.

冷冻宠物食品：冷冻宠物食品经过热处理后再辅以冷冻保存延长货架期和抑制腐败。

 

Semi-moist pet food: This generally has a low pH and contain humectants that bind water to the product, making it less available for use by invading organisms.

半湿性宠物食品：这种食品通常pH值较低，并添加能结合自由水的保水剂，使其不易被微生物利用。

 

Antioxidants 抗氧化剂

 

Antioxidants are used to protect pet food from deterioration due to oxidation. All pet food has some fat and/or oil content and these should be stabilised by including antioxidants to prevent fats from reacting with oxygen in the air (oxidising) and food becoming rancid which leads to losses in nutritional quality. The inclusion of antioxidants helps to maintain wholesomeness and quality of the food. Antioxidants are incorporated into dry and semi-moist pet food to protect them from exposure to oxygen after processing. Antioxidant preservatives that might be included in dry pet food include: a variety of herbal or plant extracts including: vitamin E (tocopherols), vitamin C (ascorbates) or man-made antioxidants, which have been used in various human food for many years.

抗氧化剂用于防止宠物食品因氧化而变质。所有的宠物食品都含有一定量的脂肪和/或油脂，需要通过添加抗氧化剂来保护它们，以防止其与空气中的氧气发生反应（即氧化）导致食物发生酸败，进而导致食品失去营养价值。抗氧化剂的加入有助于保持食物的完整性和品质。在干性和半湿性宠物食品中添加抗氧化剂，可以防止它们在加工后暴露在氧气中被氧化。干性宠物食品中会用到的抗氧化剂有：各种草本或植物提取物包括：维生素E（生育酚），维生素C（抗坏血酸）或人工合成抗氧化剂，这些抗氧化剂已在各种人类食品中使用多年。

 

Colouring agents 色素

 

Colouring agents may be added to pet food to enhance the appearance of the food. These include a range of naturally occurring food colours, food dyes or mineral based colours.

宠物食品中添加色素是为了改善食品的外观。这些色素包括：天然的食用色素、人工食用色素或矿物色素。

 

Emulsifiers and stabilisers 乳化剂和稳定剂

 

Emulsifiers help keeping the fat in the food and prevent the water from separating. Gums and lecithin are used to prevent separation of ingredients and to create the gravy or gel in canned, pouch and other moist pet food. Food gums include seaweed extracts and seed gums such as guar gum (from the guar plant).

乳化剂有助于防止食品的油水分离。胶和卵磷脂用于防止分层，并能在罐头和袋装湿粮中形成酱汁和肉冻。食品胶包括：海藻提取的胶和植物种子提取的胶，如瓜尔胶（来自瓜尔植物）。

 

Flavours 风味剂

 

Flavours are used to enhance the palatability in some pet food and to provide product variation. Much of the appeal of prepared pet food to the dog or cat stems from the choice of raw materials, such as fish, meat, vegetables or cereals. As with food for humans, the cooking process often increases the palatability of pet food. Some flavours may be added to some pet food and these can be natural flavours such as extracts from fish or poultry, or agents designed to mirror natural flavours.

风味剂被用来增强宠物食品的适口性，并为产品提供多口味。但食物的吸引力更多取决于食材的选择。与人类食物一样，烹饪过程通常会增加宠物食品的适口性。

宠物食品中添加的风味剂可以是提取自鱼或禽的天然物质，也可以是人工合成的（设计成反映天然风味）。

 

Gut flora stabilisers 肠道菌群稳定剂

 

Gut flora stabilisers such as live micro-organisms can be added to pet food and have a positive effect on the gut microbiota. These live micro-organisms, classified as zoo-technical feed additives by the European authorities and commonly known as “probiotics”, can be a good alternative to reduce the use of antibiotics in animals and more specifically in pets.

肠道菌群稳定剂，如活微生物，可以添加到宠物食品中，对肠道菌群有积极作用。这些活的微生物被欧洲监管部门归类为动物技术型饲料添加剂，一般被称为“益生菌”，可以帮助减少宠物的抗生素使用量。