According to foodwatch, even though the EU dictates that bilateral agreements for exporting meat-and-bone meal must be set up first, the Commission does not have an overview of the trade with non-EU countries in animal by-products. There is the real danger that animal meal exported to these countries can be used in human food production and thus returned to the European Union. The Commission will hold a special meeting tomorrow to find out more from Member States on illegal exports of meat-and-bone meal to Non-EU-Countries. The largest exporter, also to Vietnam and Indonesia, is Spain, which exported 140,000 tonnes in 2006, nearly tripling exports from the previous year.
"The meat industry, including Vion, Europe's largest meat group, has no scruples about getting rid of its waste in poor countries, and it even makes a profit," said Wolfschmidt. foodwatch is calling on Horst Seehofer, Germany's minister for food, agriculture and consumer protection, to make use of Germany's current presidency of the EU Council of Ministers to see through applying the same stringent rules to animal by-products that apply to transfer dangerous industrial wastes. Exports should be permitted only to OECD countries.
At a press conference on 21 February 2007, foodwatch first revealed that meat-and-bone meal had been illegally exported with the complicity of German authorities. As a non-governmental organisation that protects consumers' rights, foodwatch initiated criminal proceedings against rural district offices in Lower Saxony, as well as against SNP, a subsidiary of VION, Gepro in the PHW group, and the Beckmann fertiliser dealer. As a consequence, German authorities ended the exports and admitted that animal meal had been illegally exported to 22 countries.
