IFA national livestock chair Angus Woods has said EU authorities have to take note of the US Department of Agriculture decision to ban fresh Brazilian beef, and remove beef from any Mercosur deal.

Woods said: “Irish and European farmers will be rightly questioning how EU negotiators can continue to engage with the Mercosur countries given this decision by the USDA. The Department of Agriculture in the US has suspended all imports of fresh beef amid recurring concerns about the food safety of the product.”

Woods said the EU Commission Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) has undertaken a number of investigations on standards in Brazil and he called for these reports to be published immediately.

He challenged the Commission on the issue of standards, saying that the Mercosur countries had consistently failed to meet EU standards on the key issues of traceability, animal health and welfare controls, the ban on hormone growth promoters, and environmental controls.

He said the US authorities have recognised that there is a problem and have insisted that consumers cannot be exposed to food products that do not meet US standards.

Meat scandal

Woods said he met with the European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Vytenis Andriukaitis in Dublin recently and reiterated the IFA’s strong views on the Brazilian meat scandal.