I haven't found any info on funding either.

I asked about AAFCO because it is on pet food labels, an implied badge
of worthiness. That arouses my curiosity.

The Association of American Feed Control Officers has no address or
phone number that I can find. It appears to be a professional
organization perhaps similar to IEEE for engineers or the ACM for
computer scientists. It seems to be a feed industry standards group as
much as anything, sort of like the electronic data exchange ISO groups
for the life insurance industry.

It has no statutory authority and therefore no legally compelling
enforcement powers. The best I can find describing its limitations is at
http://www.critterchat.net/pet_supplements.htm. Let me quote:

"Let's take a closer look at the organization at the heart of this
issue. There are many misconceptions about AAFCO, the Association of
American Feed Control Officials. One is that the organization is a pawn
of the pet food industry - but nothing could be further from the truth.
This erroneous notion originally came from the listing in the AAFCO
Official Publication of not only the state feed control officials (FCOs)
who make up the voting membership, but also the many "liaison" members,
now referred to as "advisors", many of whom are affiliated with the pet
food industry, animal feed industry, and other related fields. Liaisons
have no real power in AAFCO and cannot vote. Their position is advisory
only - they are basically lobbyists. I myself was a liaison to AAFCO
from the Animal Protection Institute (a non-profit animal rights
organization) for two years. I attended all annual and semi-annual
meetings, wrote letters, made phone calls, and spoke at committee
meetings in defense of API's interests, just as other liaisons did for
their special interests. While it is true that some lobbyists have more
influence than others, ultimately the individual state Feed Control
Officials (FCOs) make up their own minds."

The problem I see in that quote is that "making up their own minds" is
nugatory.

And here is the next quote from the same web site:

"Another misconception is that AAFCO "regulates" pet foods and animal
feeds. AAFCO itself does not regulate anything, nor does it have any
enforcement powers. AAFCO is a non-profit organization serving the 50
state agencies (in most states, the department of agriculture) that do
regulate animal feed (that is, feed intended for food-producing animals
such as cattle, hogs, or chickens), and pet food. Considering the 9
billion chickens, 100 million hogs, and 37 million cattle slaughtered
for human consumption annually, in addition to 130 million companion
dogs and cats, one can see that the FCOs have their hands full. AAFCO's
primary mission is to safeguard the health of animals and man. To this
end, it provides a forum for discussion, "model" regulations, standards
for labeling, pet food nutrient profiles and feeding protocols, template
forms, and guidelines for enforcement."

Some of its constituent members, however, do have statutory authority.
These are the various state and provincial animal husbandry offices and
departments. Since I live in Texas I looked that up. The statutory
authority is the Office of the Texas State Chemist, which is run out of
Texas A&M University. It appears to be very limited in enforcement
powers, and have only minor if any concern with pet foods. It has one
pet food advisor to the Office, the owner of Merrick Pet Foods. From the
Office's web site I learn that it is funded solely by feed inspection
fees, which funding in my opinion is inadequate to ensure the worth and
purity of pet food.

Tentatively, I don't think the AAFCO endorsement on cat food labels
means much.

Dick

Most funding for AAFCO comes from the respective states. For instance
the AAFCO officials are paid employees of the state they work for.
Most of the time they are in the agriculture department or veterinary
department of the state government. Membership dues from each state
cover the cost of the operation of AAFCO, along with the sale of the
exhorbitantly expensive $50 annual AAFCO manual.