French should worry – about their beef
French should worry – about their beef
Last week the French government
surprised even its own citizens by
maintaining its ban on British beef. But
as Europe Editor, Philip Clarke, reports,
the authorities should take a look in their
own back yard
FRENCH consumers are right to be concerned about the safety of beef – not British beef, their own.
But, for a country which has seen a marked rise in the number of BSE cases, the level of understanding about what goes on in the French food chain – let alone in Britain – is pitiful.
This much was revealed in a recent BBC Radio 5 Live phone-in, when spokeswoman for the French consumers association, Odile Etienne, fielded questions in response to her countrys continuing ban on British beef.
Like most of her compatriots, she drew great comfort from the fact that France has a whole-herd slaughter policy. When there is just one case of BSE, all the animals in the same herd are destroyed, she enthused.
What she failed to grasp was that, while whole-herd slaughter has a crucial role to play in combating virulent diseases like foot-and-mouth, it is almost irrelevant in controlling BSE where there is no horizontal transmission.
Furthermore, without an over 30-month slaughter scheme, it gives no protection whatsoever from the cull cows which have already been removed from the herd. These will have already been eaten by consumers, no doubt reassured by the Viande Francaise label, which all French meat must carry.
Ms Etienne also pointed to the lower incidence of BSE in France. "That is a statistical fact," she said. But can she be sure? Another effect of whole herd slaughter is to eliminate animals which may be incubating the disease. That may mask the true incidence of BSE.
Which leads to the question of under-reporting. A 1997 EU study concluded that the number of BSE cases showing up throughout Europe was far less than expected, based on the level of live exports from the UK between 1985 and 1992. Combined with the significant tonnage of cull cows exported to France (whose bones would have gone into meat and bone-meal), not to mention the shipments of potentially contaminated feed, common sense suggests there should be many more BSE casualties.
Certainly there has been an acceleration, with 25 cases reported so far this year, out of 74 in total. While this is still insignificant compared with England and Wales, it is interesting to note that France now has more BSE than either Northern Ireland or Scotland.
Specified risk material controls are also less demanding in France than in the UK, with non-ruminant meat and bonemeal fed to its livestock, while calf brains are still a delicacy in some top restaurants.
If Ms Etienne realised this, she certainly wasnt mentioning it.
But her lack of understanding of the UKs date-based export scheme was even more alarming. Like her government, she said UK beef could only be considered totally safe five years after meat and bonemeal was withdrawn from all UK cattle feed – ie 2001.
This overlooks all the other controls the UK has in place. The fact that all meat for export comes from young animals, which have never had access to meat and bonemeal, which are de-boned and with all the SRMs removed, seemed to pass Ms Etienne by.
Sadly it also seems to have passed her government by.
But not all French people are so blind to the facts, least of all Gerard Pascal who chairs the EUs Scientific Steering Committee.
"It is not certain that the risk from BSE is any better controlled in France than in the UK or any other member state," he told a recent meeting of the French Agricultural Academy. "Cull cows are still eaten in France. Who can give an assurance that animals incubating BSE never go into the abattoir?" *