GAPFA aims to harness the collective experience of the global pet food industry and key external stakeholders to promote science-based guidelines to promote commercial pet food as a safe commodity by respecting sanitary safety and thereby safeguarding world trade of pet food products and pet food samples. To this end, GAPFA supports the application of appropriate principles requirements for use by the pet food industry to aid in the protection of importing countries from the introduction of foreign diseases and pathogens, without imposing unnecessary sanitary and trade barriers. Pet food samples are often required ahead of other commercial arrangements for a variety of reasons, for instance, to ensure that raw materials meet nutritional, safety, and sensory requirements. Likewise, samples of finished product may be required for similar purposes or for other types of research. As such, samples normally require a different set of requirements to commercial trade and the process for authority approval differs by jurisdiction.  This GAPFA Guidance on Trading of Pet Food Samples has been developed to provide guidance to navigate the different approaches to importing sample management; it does not consider every individual scenario and should not replace independent professional or local regulatory advice.