Brussels, 28/01/2014 (Agence Europe) - In February, the European Parliament will vote (plenary session on 3-6 February) on the European Commission's proposals on labelling requirements on where fresh, refrigerated and frozen meat, pork, mutton/goat and poultry come from. Current requirements are deemed to fall far short of what is needed by MEPs on the Parliamentary environmental and food safety committee. According to the MEPs, this draft regulation establishing the implementing arrangements for the EU regulation on consumer information on foodstuffs (Regulation 1169/2011) will also create confusion among consumers, when the source of the meat is a major concern for them. The MEPs are calling on the plenary session to reject this text and call for the Commission to review its draft. A draft resolution on this call was adopted on 22 January last (34 votes to 21, with 3 abstentions).
The environment committee would like the Commission to draft a revised version of the implementing regulation, to include a demand for compulsory labelling of the place of birth, place of rearing and place of slaughter of these kinds of meat, in compliance with legislation or compulsory labelling of beef meat and beef products that have been in force in the EU since 1 January 2002. MEPs also want the Commission to get rid of any exemptions to these requirements for minced and compressed meat.
Glenis Willmott (S&D, United Kingdom), the author of the draft resolution said that what was wanted was compulsory labelling for the place of birth, rearing and slaughter of all meat, which was already the case for beef meat. She said that this would let consumers know whether the animal had been transported a long way and transited through countries that applied high standards of animal welfare. The Commission wants only the place of rearing and slaughter of the animals to be obligatory in labelling. With regard to pork meat, the country of rearing would be the one in which the animal had spent four months but this would just be one month for poultry. The labelling of the place of production/origin is already compulsory for beef meat and pork meat, mutton/goat and poultry. Regulation 1169/2011 introduced new labelling rules for labelling meat so that consumers would know about the origin of fresh pork, sheep, goat meat and poultry. It also stipulates that the Commission should introduce specific rules on compulsory labelling of the origin of meat and clarifie the way in which the new rules will apply on the voluntary labelling of meat sauces. In a resolution adopted in January on measures to be taken in tackling fraud in the food chain, Parliament called for a legislative proposal to make the mention of the origin of meat in prepared meals compulsory (see EUROPE 10996). (AN/transl.fl)