The quality of pet food has direct welfare implications — nutritional deficiencies, inappropriate ingredients, and misleading labelling affect millions of companion animals.
Pet food quality is a direct welfare issue — what companion animals eat determines their long-term health, disease susceptibility, and quality of life. The pet food market combines rigorously formulated, nutritionally complete products with poorly evidenced options that may cause harm. Raw meat diets, while increasingly popular, carry genuine pathogen risks for both animals and human household members. Grain-free diets became fashionable but have been associated with cardiac disease in some dogs, illustrating how owner preferences can diverge from evidence-based nutritional recommendations. Life-stage feeding — providing age-appropriate nutrition — is well-established in the evidence. The challenge for owners is navigating a market where marketing claims frequently outpace nutritional evidence, requiring veterinary guidance and critical evaluation of product claims.