Report on meeting of Council Working Group on food hygiene legislation: 29 September 2009

The Commission presented its draft conclusions, which were mostly agreed. It was felt the conclusions should emphasise the scale of the change from the pre-2006 rules, and should cross-reference to regulation 178/2002, particularly the requirement for food business operators (FBOs) to take full responsibility for food safety. Also, it was suggested that more emphasis should be placed on risk assessment. A second draft of the conclusions will be circulated and presented to a Council meeting in due course.

An in-depth examination of the report was made by the Commission to give member states an opportunity to make more detailed comments as follows:

Scope
Some member states felt there should be some harmonisation of the rules relating to small quantities, as there were problems with cross-border trade. However, others felt that it would be difficult to achieve, due to differing situations across the EU, and flexibility was needed to allow different procedures to coexist.

Definitions
The issues of definitions for invertebrates and lagomorphs were raised. Some member states thought that EFSA should be asked to carry out a risk assessment.

Primary production
Member states felt that the provisions of regulation 852/2004 were not easy to apply in practice. The new cross-compliance regulation refers to Annexe 1 of 852, and this could help to apply the requirements. The general record keeping requirements in Annexe 1 of regulation 852/2004 should be clarified.

Registration and approval
Member states expressed concern that there were no specific regulations for breeding establishments within regulation 852/2004 covering the storage and selling of live snails prior to being sold retailers etc. The Commission commented that because snails are live animals, any premises breeding or storing them was a primary production facility. Only when snails are processed do they come under the provisions of regulation 853/2004. The Commission said that if other member states had concerns then it could be discussed at the next meeting of the Hygiene Working Group in November.

Guides to good practice
One member state reminded the Commission that no guidelines for wild game existed, but as this had been discussed last year at the Hygiene Working Group, it could be resurrected if member states so wished.

Flexibility
Member states still had concerns around the definition of flexibility in the legislation, and how to embed this into the general principles of the hygiene package.

Imports
Member states suggested that the Commission should hold a working group to resolve the problems surrounding composite products, because at present only a transitional regulation is in force. The animal health requirements were some way ahead of the public health requirements.

Official controls in relation to products of animal origin
Some member states thought that ante-mortem and post-mortem inspection tasks should not be delegated to official auxiliaries.

Member states also expressed problems with accrediting labs in small slaughterhouses.

Microcriteria
A query was raised as to the possibility of giving competent authorities powers to collect aggregated, anonymous microbiological results, in order to get an overview of the situation in member states.

Food Chain Information (FCI)
Some member states felt there was a need for harmonisation of the minimum requirements of FCI.

Emergency slaughter
Some member states thought that different approaches create problems for intra-community trade. Others felt that if meat from emergency slaughter is fit for domestic markets, it should be fit for the wider EU market.

An issue was raised concerning mobile slaughterhouses. It was felt that there should be a working group set up, as some clarity in this area would be good for the market and for animal welfare.

Other priority areas
The Presidency asked member states if there were any other important areas that had not been reflected in the Commission’s report. Member states raised a number of technical points:

• a query was raised concerning the status of proposals on traceability (1489 and 1490). The Commission confirmed that these were still under internal discussion, and they hoped to return to them shortly
• further detailed questions were raised concerning the treatment of live snails
• a request for definition of frozen products was raised
• it was felt that temperature requirements for milk should be included in the hygiene package, as these had been lost when regulation 92/46 was revoked

The Commission felt that most of these problems could be resolved in its Hygiene Working Group.

The Presidency thanked member states for their detailed comments, a summary of which would be appended to the Council conclusions. It would circulate a revised draft of these shortly. Further written comments were requested by 2 October.

There is unlikely to be a further meeting of the working group for the foreseeable future.