Emergency summit call over illegal pork
Pig producers are demanding action after it emerged that European countries will fail to comply with a ban on sow stalls that comes into force next month.
The National Pig Association (NPA) claims about 40,000 pigs reared under production systems that become illegal on 1 January will continue to enter the European food chain every hour after that deadline, with their meat destined for Britain’s supermarkets, corner shops and restaurants.
The pigs will come from continental farms where sows are still confined in individual steel cages known as “stalls” – a practice outlawed by European Union animal welfare legislation from 1 January 2013. Stalls have not been used in the UK since 1999.
NPA chairman and Yorkshire pig farmer Richard Longthorp said: “It makes a mockery of Europe’s animal welfare legislation.”
“As the United Kingdom imports around 60% of its pork – much of it as processed food such as ham and bacon – shoppers will need to be very careful about what they choose from supermarket shelves and when eating out in restaurants.’
Only the UK, Sweden and Luxembourg have banned the use of sow stalls, with producers spending considerable sums of money updating and modernising their systems, adding to already-high costs of production while cheaper imports flood the market.
Matthew Curtis, managing director of pig-breeding company ACMC, said: “Imports of such meat will have serious implications for British pig farmers who follow high welfare practices and who have had to comply with a total ban on sow stalls for over a decade.”
“Due to cheaper production methods this lower-welfare meat could undercut UK-produced meat and the fiasco in the EU surrounding non-compliance with the battery-cage ban in 2012 will pale into insignificance compared with this.”
Matthew Curtis, managing director of ACMC
“Due to cheaper production methods this lower-welfare meat could undercut UK-produced meat and the fiasco in the EU surrounding non-compliance with the battery-cage ban in 2012 will pale into insignificance compared with this.”
An emergency summit to discuss the situation should involve all UK retailers, wholesalers, slaughter-processors, producers and consumer bodies to ensure no pigmeat from illegal production systems in the EU enters the UK, said Mr Curtis.
“There should be harsh penalties to ensure that retailers and wholesalers found to be importing this meat take responsibility for the consequences of their actions.”
Any meat in UK shops and supermarkets from such illegal production systems would undermine the credibility of the brand image of the retailer, wholesaler and slaughter-processor and further damage the profitability of the British pig producers, who are already suffering a crisis situation.”
DEFRA said ministers had already met representatives of the whole pig supply chain to ensure they had stringent traceability tests in place to source pig meat from compliant productions systems in January.
Farm minister David Heath said: “It is extremely frustrating that many EU member states will not have banned the use of sow stalls by January, when they have known about it for 12 years. Sow stalls are cruel, they restrict the sow to such an extent that she can’t turn around for almost her entire life.”
The UK had been pressing the European Commission to ensure the ban is enforced across the EU, said Mr Heath. The commission had assured him it would launch formal infringement proceedings against any EU member state that was not compliant in January.
Mr Heath added: “British pig farmers should be rewarded, not disadvantaged for having quality welfare conditions. Shoppers care about where their meat comes from and what conditions the animals are reared in.”