Rodents may consume human food at all stages of production and processing, including transportation of food to its final destination. In commercial factories that produce food for human consumption, the presence of rodents may be very hazardous and costly. They not only cause the loss of food that they consume, but also the whole portion or batch of food in the vicinity that they have come in contact. This is caused by cross-contamination, through droppings, urine and hair mostly. In this respect, a large batch of product must be disposed of due to health risks. If a rodent damages food during preparation, the cost to remove the damage may outweigh the cost of the food itself, and the food would then be wasted.
In large infestations, the actual consumption of the food itself is significant. One house mouse consumes 3 grams of food per day, which means its yearly consumption may be over 1 kilogram. If there are 500 house mice in an area, this represents over half of a tonne of food consumed by these rodents in 1 year.