EU seeks French BSE assurances

Italian farmers took matters into their own hands, blocking French beef imports at the border

BRUSSELS, Belgium (CNN) -- The European Union has demanded assurances from Paris that consumers in other EU countries were not being exposed to a greater risk of mad cow disease than those in France.

Alarmed by a rising number of cases of mad cow disease or BSE, France has banned the sale of T-bone steaks and all animal feed made from ground up cattle, so called meat and bonemeal.

The EU's food safety commissioner, David Byrne, told French Farm Minister Jean Glavany that whatever measures had been taken on a national basis had to be matched for exports.

"I need clarification of the measures which France intends to put in place to ensure that its beef exports do not expose consumers in other countries to a higher risk than French consumers," Byrne told a meeting of EU farm ministers.

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"For example, will there be exports of meat and bonemeal from France? What measures does France propose to ensure that the T-bone steak is removed from carcasses for export?" he said.

Over the weekend, French authorities moved to soothe consumers' fears about BSE, taking out a full-page newspaper advertisement under the headline "Why you can eat beef without fear."

Beef sales have plunged by 40 percent in recent weeks.

Public panic has been fuelled by television coverage of people suffering the deadly human form of mad cow disease, variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD), which has so far killed two people in France and more than 80 in Britain.

According to French Government sources, Glavany will use the meeting to urge France's EU partners to take joint action against mad cow disease in a bid to avoid isolation within the bloc.

But there were signs many member states will not support a blanket ban on meat and bonemeal.

"There is no need for a ban if the bonemeal is treated properly," German Farm Minister Karl-Heinz Funke said, referring to laws requiring meat to be heated to high temperature before it is processed.

Britain, Portugal and now France have extended the feed ban to cover all livestock and poultry, but at EU level there is currently a ban on such feed for ruminants only.

Byrne said he was sticking to his line that scientific advice showed no need to extend the ban to all animal feed, provided all controls and checks were observed.

France also used Monday's talks to push all EU member states to start testing cattle for the disease as soon as possible.

A limited testing programme comes into force across the EU on January 1, but the European Commission, backed by Paris, is pushing to bring forward the deadline and extend its scope.

But some member states, which currently have no BSE, are balking at the cost of the tests, about $25 per test.

In Italy, farmers mounted illegal blockades on the border with France in a move they said was to police a ban on imports of French meat and cattle that could be infected with mad cow disease.

The Italian farmers' spokesman, Sergio Panizza, said they were demanding to see the cargo documents carried by the French drivers.

"We are doing what the (Italian) government should do," he said.

The Italian farmers said they would continue to stop traffic until the government agreed to compensate them for sales lost because of the disease scare in France.

BSE was first identified in Britain in the 1980s, sweeping through the cattle herd via infected animal feed. At its height, there were thousands of new cases every month and millions of cattle have been slaughtered at a huge cost to the taxpayer.

The EU banned all British beef exports in March 1996, dealing a devastating blow to the country's livestock industry.

The ban was eased last year although France continues to block British beef. Now several EU countries have announced unilateral import restrictions on French beef following the mad cow scare there.

Reuters contributed to this report.

French mad cow fears spark Italian blockades
November 20, 2000
France fears isolation over BSE
November 17, 2000
French blame 'mad cow' on Britain
November 11, 2000
BSE scare sparks feed ban call
November 10, 2000

French Agriculture Ministry
Human BSE Foundation
European Union: BSE and public and animal health

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