Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-05-21-Speech-3-483"
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"en.20080521.31.3-483"2
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"Mr President, my thanks to the Commissioner and to the rapporteur for the work done. Can I just say, on the issue of food imports from third countries which has been mentioned in practically every contribution, that there is a real belief among EU producers that a blind eye is turned to the standards of food produced outside our borders. I really believe that unless we have the confidence of our farmers and producers that we are looking after their interests, we will not get their full commitment for measures that we take within the European Union. This is a most fundamental point. It has already been addressed. Take the issue of caged egg production: we will shift it outside of Europe unless we can incorporate standards in the WTO negotiations and at this point we have not achieved our objectives in that regard.
Moving onto the issues in this report, we know that human health is affected by animal health: 60% of human infections originate from animals and a vast number of the emerging diseases originate in animals. It is hard to predict but we do need to address and have a coherent animal health strategy across the European Union.
The issue of biosecurity is very important and farmers must be involved in preventing disease. But can I give you an example: badgers are a protected species under the Berne Convention, so how does a farmer protect himself and his herd against a badger with TB, and who should carry the cost when there is a problem? I worry about moving from cost-sharing to cost-shifting if our concern is the budget we have to spend. So we do need to look at these particular issues: in bluetongue, in avian influenza, in foot-and-mouth diseases, we do need stringent border controls and appropriate vaccination programmes. And we need to really look at those measures very seriously because the problems are increasing.
On animal transport, let us base all our measures on science – good science – so that we do not cause problems. Let us not react to the emotional part of this debate, but use science as our barometer. I do not accept that large is worse than small or small is better than large; I think all animals, whether they are groups of 10 or 100, must be looked after."@en1
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