Archive

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE MEAT hygiene committee of the world food standards body Codex Alimentarius has approved the integration of rules for “processed meat” and “meat preparations” into its draft code of hygienic practice for meat, which has previously focused on fresh meat.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has approved as safe for turkeys and sows the feed additive Finase. It is designed to improve phosphorus utilisation in monogastric animals fed cereal-based diets, lowering phosphorus excretion. It has already been provisionally approved for fattening chickens, pigs and piglets, but EFSA could not conclude it was safe for laying hens.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
HEALTH officials in British Columbia, Canada, have issued a gruesome alert, warning that remains of several women murdered on Vancouver-area farm may have been fed to its pigs, later slaughtered for pork. Although there was no evidence of “cross-contamination”, officials said there was a possibility, adding the chances of becoming sick from the meat were small.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has banned the import into the European Union (EU) of live poultry, poultry meat and products from Canada, following the conformed outbreak of bird flu in poultry at a British Columbia farm. As with the recent US outbreak, this virus strain differs from the Asian version, posing a smaller public health risk.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
REFORMS to France’s collective system for disposing of slaughter waste and dead farm livestock have been approved as legitimate state aid by the European Commission; since January, these have been funded by direct grants and compulsory levies on slaughterhouses, butchers and farmers.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
SIGNIFICANT delays are now expected to the introduction of a package of European Union (EU) food hygiene laws, with the European Parliament sticking to its guns over the need to allow public officials to inspect the slaughter of pigs and veal calves, a job the European Commission would allow abattoirs to undertake themselves.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Parliament has called for the development of mobile abattoirs as an answer to reduce the need for livestock to be transported long distances to be slaughtered. In a consultative report on European Commission plans to tighten livestock transport rules, it says mobile slaughterhouses would also boost employment in depressed rural areas.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission is taking Germany and Austria to the European Court of Justice, asking it to order the abolition of a system requiring licensed private organic food production inspection offices to be located on their national territories.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
WESTERN European animal health specialists will help man new external border posts in the European Union (EU) while 10 eastern and southern European countries join the continental bloc in May. These veterinary experts will advise their new member country counterparts on administering EU animal and animal product health laws in the weeks before and after accession.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
BSE-INSPIRED consumer hesitancy in Europe about beef seems finally to fading into the past, with European Union (EU) consumption outstripping production, a trend that the European Commission says should last for at least seven years. Part of this, says its report on ‘medium-term prospects for agricultural markets and income in the European Union 2003-2010’ is explained by a decline in beef farmer numbers, with production falling by 1.9 per cent.…