EU controls on the standards of Brazilian beef imports were defended yesterday by Robert Madelin, director general of the EU Commission for Health and Consumer Protection.
He told the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture and Food that inspection visits to Brazil last July had found that in the public health area, great efforts had been made to correct deficiencies detected in previous food and veterinary inspections.
"Where significant problems have been found, action has been taken by the commission to address the problems," he told the committee.
The committee had invited Commissioner Kypriananou to come to Dublin following complaints by the Irish Farmers' Association over a previous report by the EU inspectors in November and December last year. But the director general said that a further inspection visit to Brazil in July last had found great efforts had been made to rectify those deficiencies.
He told the members that 16 meat plants were visited by the EU team which was made up of experts drawn from all the disciplines necessary to carry out in-depth inspections. He said that some of these inspections were planned and some were surprise inspections.
"The general and specific hygiene standards, traceability systems and veterinary controls and supervision were acceptable in all the establishments visited," he said.
Mr Madelin said the commission was fully aware of the foot-and-mouth disease situation in Brazil and was constantly monitoring it through inspection visits.
He said this had resulted in large regions of Brazil being banned from exporting beef and that the banned regions accounted for 60 per cent of Brazil's beef production. He also said he did not believe more stringent controls were necessary and the inspection regime, both in export countries and of food being imported, were sufficient to give guarantees to consumers.
The IFA, which met Mr Madelin after the committee meeting, carried out its own fact finding mission to foot-and-mouth restricted areas last May and said it had found disease controls to be totally inadequate, environmental degradation and social exploitation were also widespread.