Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

As the Deputy will be aware, some considerable time ago we put forward a proposal to the European Commission in respect of country of origin labelling for pigmeat, sheepmeat and poultrymeat. Unfortunately, the European Commission rejected our proposals and we were not allowed to proceed with them. Now the issue of adequate labelling is again under discussion in the Commission and we have put forward a very strong proposal in that regard.

Regarding the domestic market, which is important in the context of pork products, the Bord Bia quality assurance scheme is of huge importance to the sector and is very well supported by many of the producers and individual primary producers who want to see more use made of it.

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