Eu Rejects German Call To Boycot British Lamb
Germany's representative to the European Union's veterinary committee Werner Zwingmann said on Wednesday consumers should buy sheepmeat from countries other than Britain until the scientific advice was clearer.
We don't support any such recommendation because we don't see any grounds for it, the Commission's chief spokesman Nikolaus van der Pas told a news briefing.
He said further scientific study was required and if it was found that action was needed it should be taken by the European Union.
He said a proposal last month by EU farm commissioner Franz Fischler to ban sheep brains, spleens and spinal cords from the human and animal food chains was a highly specific and precautionary move to protect human health.
Fischler proposed EU-wide measures after reports from Britain and France that under laboratory conditions sheep could contract Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy or mad cow disease.
But Fischler agreed to review his proposal after the EU's standing veterinary committee, made up of senior national animal health officials, questioned if such action was justified as there was only a slight risk to human health.
Spanish Farm Minister Loyola de Palacio had earlier accused Fischler at an EU farm ministers' meeting of causing unjustified alarm through dangerous generalisation..
Only France and Britain backed Fischler's proposal.
The EU's scientific veterinary and multidisciplinary committees are due to re-examine the issue early next month and make recommendations to the senior veterinary officials.
Sheep have long been known to contract scrapie, a brain-wasting disease similar to BSE which is believed to have been transferred to cattle through feed containing animal waste.
British farmers denied on Thursday there was any danger to human health from their sheep, but expressed concern that German government advice to consumers to avoid British lamb might influence consumers across Europe.
What we have to be extremely careful of is how other countries are going to take Germany's lead, Welsh National Farmers' Union (NFU) chairman John Lloyd Jones said on BBC radio.
Bonn has led efforts to protect public health after consumer confidence collapsed in March after a British report suggested humans could contract an illness similar to mad cow disease by eating contaminated beef.
Germany imported 47,600 sheep from Britain last year, nearly half of total imports. It brought in 4,275 tonnes of British mutton, some 10 percent of overall imports.
On Wednesday that consumers avoid eating British mutton until scientists determine whether mad cow disease can be transmitted to sheep.
Until this is cleared up by the European Union's scientific panels