The European Parliament approved, by 560 votes in favour, 75 against and 25 abstentions, on Tuesday 16 June, the text resulting from an agreement with the EU Council aimed at strengthening farmers’ position in the food supply chain (see EUROPE 13844/7).
For Céline Imart (EPP, French), rapporteur on this dossier, the new regulation is an essential step forward for European livestock farming, “by reserving designations such as ‘steak’ and ‘liver’ for genuine animal products and prohibiting laboratory cell-based products from being passed off as what they are not”.
The text does indeed introduce a definition of ‘meat’ as the “edible parts of animals” and establishes a list of terms reserved exclusively for meat products. These designations may not be used for products that do not contain meat, in particular products grown in laboratories or derived from cell cultures. These terms include, in particular, ‘beef’, ‘veal’, ‘pork’, ‘poultry’, ‘chicken’, ‘turkey’, ‘steak’ and ‘liver’.
Farm Europe welcomed a text that clarifies the use of meat-related designations in order to avoid misleading practices and protect the value of agricultural products.
Link to the text: https://aeur.eu/f/mdr (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)