Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate on the very important issues of food safety, food security and consumer protection. Eight pages of the script of the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food related to agricultural policy and they outlined in detail the advances made in agriculture. She devoted almost half of her speaking time to this subject. It was impossible to disagree with much of what she said but her failure to address the central point of the debate until the second half of her speech indicates a lack of resources, and perhaps a lack of interest in or commitment to the points raised in the motion.

Food security has always been a major concern in Ireland for a variety of reasons. It reflects historic concerns about famine, concerns about the quality and safety of our food as a major export commodity and concerns about an industry at the heart of the economy of rural Ireland as well as being of everyday importance to the consumer. There is no need for us to go into denial over the importance of protecting our market share in the ever-expanding global market. It is becoming a little bit like the elephant in the corner in that it somehow seems we should not acknowledge out loud that we need to protect our agriculture industry, which is so important in terms of the rural economy, employment and exports. It is important to acknowledge that we need to compete, and we want to be able to compete on a level playing field.

It is crucial that we operate on a level playing field when in competition with the major players that have the capacity to out-produce us by a factor of thousands. Scale is so important in countries such as Brazil whereas Ireland cannot compete on this basis; it must compete on the basis of quality. Food quality is what underpins Irish food products and it is the hallmark on which we depend to compete. If quality is to be our trademark, it is therefore reasonable to assume that Ireland, as a country that produces quality meat to high standards, should demand that its standards apply to what are, in effect, its competitors.

Let me address the issue of Brazilian imports. The Food Safety Authority of Ireland has overall responsibility for food safety in Ireland. The Food and Veterinary Office of the European Commission is responsible for food safety and animal health control at EU level and this is why I reviewed the various reports from the Food and Veterinary Office over a number of years, which reports make very interesting reading. The Commission is the body responsible for monitoring the safety of food and the state of animal health in Brazil, among other third countries, in so far as its produce is imported into EU countries.

A report published in 2005 on the control of residues and contaminants in live animals and animal products noted that "most of the deficiencies found in 2003 have still not been rectified and many of the promised actions did not in fact happen". It stated that several veterinary medicine products containing substances not authorised for use in food producing animals in the EU are authorised for food producing animals in Brazil. The report mentions that "farmers and veterinarians are not inspected with regard to the usage of VMPs", or veterinary medicine products. The report concluded that "the design of the NRCP [national residue control plan] is incomplete and insufficient".

A report prepared in August and September of 2005 on foot and mouth disease and traceability and certification procedures stated that "despite several guarantees provided by the Brazilian competent authority in response to previous mission reports, several shortcomings were noted in the management of foot and mouth disease controls at establishment level". As a result, the situation had not improved. That survey was carried out in 2005.

Two reports were carried out in 2006. One was published in the January-February period and addressed animal health controls, in particular foot and mouth disease, as well as animal identification and certification procedures. Eleven recommendations were made arising from it pertaining to the following: the need to improve animal identification, to ensure that deficiencies in measures to control foot and mouth disease outbreaks are rectified and to provide guarantees that deficiencies which are detected, and concern about laboratory testing, are corrected.

In September 2006, another mission took place to evaluate the foot and mouth disease controls which are in place, particularly the zero surveillance programme and the laboratory testing procedures. While it was recognised that improvements had been made since the previous visit, it was also noted that laboratories are not externally accredited and that the sensitivity of the tests for virus detection are not confirmed by external quality assurance.

The most recent report on the website of the Commission's Food and Veterinary Office relates to a visit to Brazil that was made in February and March 2007. The report, which relates to residue control in that country, concluded that a great deal of progress had been made in realising the objectives of the national residues control plan, in comparison with previous years. I would like to mention a few key points which were made in the report. It states:

However, the current absence of testing for certain residues of medicines which are likely to be used in specific production sectors (e.g. organophosphate ectoparasiticides in cattle), leaves Brazil in the position of not having objective evidence to underpin residue guarantees for certain food commodities.

It continues:

The current lack of formal accreditation of the governmental laboratory network to ISO 17025 means that the confidence of the competent authority in the performance of these laboratories and the quality of analytical results produced therein is reduced.

It further states:

The fact that some Brazilian .... maximum residue limits for pharmacologically active substances are higher than the respective Community limits means that there is a possibility that consignments of food which do not comply with Community MRLs [maximum residue limits] could be exported to the EU.

While the report acknowledges that improvements have been made, it makes it clear that the Brazilian standards are improving from a very low base. There has been a great deal of improvement by comparison with previous standards.

Major deficiencies of this nature have been allowed to continue without interruption or control for a number of years. The Food and Veterinary Office does quite a good job by recording and reporting its inspections in a robust manner. It has reported the various Brazilian deficiencies to the Commission in reports that have been published every year since 2002, but nothing has happened. Like the FVO, I acknowledge that there have been improvements, but there are still deficiencies. The EU has continued to import meat from Brazil, other than when foot and mouth disease was considered to be a particular risk. When these discrepancies were clearly acknowledged in printed FVO reports over the past four or five years, why did the Government fail to call for changes to be made to EU policy? The Minister, Deputy Coughlan, and her predecessors should have been shouting from the rooftops about the poor standards applying in Brazil, such as its lack of compliance with basic food safety and training requirements.

This debate was partly prompted by the recent IFA visit to Brazil. The IFA delegation reported what it found in that country to the European Commission, which then exercised its right to reply. The Commission knocked a number of the IFA's arguments on the head. In its report, the IFA highlighted a number of deficiencies, two of which I would focus on if I had more time. The bottom line is that Brazilian controls and standards do not match up to those in Ireland. It is incredible that the European Commission allowed such lax practices to go unchecked over many years.

I will conclude by referring to labelling in the context of the substantial transformation loophole. The two most significant findings of the food labelling group that reported to the Government in 2002 were that problems with country of origin labelling had been partially addressed and that the substantial transformation issue had not been addressed at all. The labelling of Irish food has always been a quagmire. Interpreting the information on labels presents a challenge to the best informed among us. What chance do average consumers have when they are confronted with a plethora of information, often deliberately couched in jargon, as they try to learn more about the quality and real nature of the food they are about to present to their children? I accept that under legislation which was recently introduced, beef labelling requirements were extended to the 30,000 service sector premises which are registered with the HSE and monitored by the Food Safety Authority. It appears that inspections to ensure compliance with that legislation take place sporadically. They are conducted by the Food Safety Authority, which is also responsible for monitoring other aspects of food hygiene. I have been unable to ascertain the precise number of inspections which have been conducted. I do not know whether there have been any prosecutions. I cannot tell what degree of compliance is to be found in the sector. No information is available to help me to track the progress that is being made. However, there is anecdotal evidence to suggest that compliance levels are less than overwhelming. I support the motion.

See this speech in context