Search Results for: food

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EU Council of Minister has approved an EU action plan to promote organic food and farming. It includes EU funding of information and sales promotions, boosting the collection of statistics, more research and harmonisation of organic farming standards.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has hailed as safe the use of additive TBHQ (tertiary-butylhydroquinone) in fats and oils.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) has lost patience with the United States and Canada’s refusal to lift retaliatory tariffs targeting meat products, in place since 1999 because of Brussels’ import ban on certain beef treated with growth hormones. It has launched a World Trade Organisation (WTO) case claiming that Ottawa and Washington are breaking WTO rules by refusing to lift the duties on foodstuffs including Danish premium-quality hams French hams and goose liver pate, and German pork.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
GERMAN clay producer Fuchs is at the centre of a row involving the contamination of animal feed with dioxin, after its kaolin – used by agricultural to separate potato peels from potatoes – was found to contain the cancer-causing chemical.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has lifted bans on exports from China into the EU of shrimps, farmed fish, honey, royal jelly and rabbit meat, after Beijing improved its anti-biotic controls in food production.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has proposed abolishing rules setting pack sizes across Europe for a range of consumer products, including detergents, pet food, ice cream, frozen food, low alcoholic drinks, soft drinks, cleaning products, paints, shampoo and toothpaste. As existing detailed European Union (EU) rules regulate the sizes for products being exported to other EU countries, the liberalisation would make it easier for retailers to import goods at whatever size they want.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has approved an EU regulation on materials and articles in contact with food, allowing the use across Europe of ‘intelligent materials’ that inform consumers about the freshness of products. Until now, EU legislation had effectively banned many of these new packaging materials because of health concerns.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) financial watchdog the Court of Auditors has claimed in an assessment of 2001’s Food and Mouth Disease outbreak that the European Commission should have laid better contingency plans for such an epidemic. Also, it has criticised certain inconsistencies in compensation paid meat producers in different EU countries.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A EUROPEAN Union (EU) reference laboratory playing a key role in a new EU authorisation system for feed additives has been launched. Sited at the EU’s Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements (IRMM), in Geel, Belgium, the laboratory will check methods used to detect residues in feed and food and maintain reference samples of all approve additives.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
DOMESTIC ducks may act as healthy carriers for the H5N1 bird flu virus, passing it to chickens to whom the disease is deadly, the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation is (FAO) claiming. In a joint statement with the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Office International des Épizooties (OIE) has warned that in its Asian heartland, the disease may be spread through free-range farming practices, where chickens and ducks roam together.…