Growth Promoting products approved by the FDA since 1986

How did we increase beef production per animal by some 80% in 50 years? No one single factor was responsible for this trend. Rather it was the accumulation of many technological changes that have combined over a period of years to give us this more efficient beef production system.
Here is a list of some of the major technological contributors:

1. Pharmaceuticals; other animal health products and programs
   1. Antibiotics
   2. Implants
   3. Ionophores
   4. Repartitioning agents
   5. Parasiticides
   6. Vaccines
   7. Estrus regulation
   8. USDA disease/pest eradication programs
2. Genetics
   1. Beef
   2. Dairy
3. Nutrition
   1. Breeding cattle
   2. Pasture supplementation
   3. Stocker and backgrounder operations
   4. Feedlots
4. Grain yields, and feed costs

Underlying this list is the fact that the cattle business is a market-oriented, profit-seeking, and price/cost-driven industry that is incredibly competitive. The result has been that cost-reducing technology is sought out and adopted by the industry, especially the feedlot segment. Also, because input suppliers see a large and accepting business for new technology for the cattle industry, significant incentives are present to discover and market new products that save cost and resources in the beef production system.

While the incentives for technology adoption are high, the availability of new pharmaceutical technology has been limited by high costs and long review times for the approval process of the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine. In recent years the number of innovative, new drugs for animal agriculture has been a slow trickle. Although cattle have received a high share of the approvals, the total number of truly new animal drugs that have been approved has been less than one per year in recent years. No new compounds were approved in 2000, 2001 or 2003.

New Chemical Entities Approved by FDA/CVM
For Food Producing Animals, 1986-2003