Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-07-05-Speech-3-241"
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"en.20000705.7.3-241"2
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"Mr President, the report by Mr Papayannakis we are discussing is an important tool to improve consumer protection and increase consumer confidence in food in Europe. The committee took an important decision in rejecting the category of animal labelling proposal. The category of animal – heifer, cow, bull, bullock, young bull, calf – will not provide the consumer with any extra information, as the differences within categories might be greater than those between them. On the other hand, the compulsory labelling of category would increase the production costs of fresh meat products by what could be a large percentage figure, which, of course, would be passed on to the consumer. On this there is agreement between beef producers, the meat processing industry, retailers and consumer organisations. And now the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy has arrived at the same conclusion. Category labelling must not be compulsory, but this can happen on a national basis, as, for example, has been the wish in France. Perhaps in a country the size of France there is so much beef that it is possible to label products rationally. That is not the case in my country.
Another thorny problem relating to the proposal is labelling showing the origin of the meat. The proposal is for the labelling system to be introduced in two stages. In the first stage there would just be slaughter information. In cases where the animal was bred and reared in another country, the information might be totally misleading for the consumer, and in countries where stage two is now in force the situation as it is could only deteriorate. For example, Finland’s national beef labelling system also now includes information on where the animal was bred and reared. It is therefore to be hoped that, on the basis of the current defining implementation regulation, the beef sector could be flexible enough to come round to establishing the two-stage labelling system.
The basis of this discussion is consumer protection, especially with regard to the BSE crisis we lived through in Europe. The matter being discussed is an important tool, but the compulsory labelling of beef products and the gradual switch to labels showing the origin of the meat do not serve this purpose."@en1
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