On Tuesday, the European Commission released the results of an EU-wide DNA testing programme launched in response to the processed meat crisis that emerged in the UK and Northern Ireland in January.

image expired

The scandal began when burgers labelled as containing 100 percent beef, being produced by two companies in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland for sale by major retailers, including Tesco, were found to contain traces of horsemeat in tests carried out by Irish food safety officials. As the scandal deepened, more meat businesses, major caterers and retailers were implicated across Europe and pig DNA was discovered in processed products labelled as Halal.

In response to the growing scope of the scandal, and evidence that long, convoluted supply chains were affecting traceability and transparency, the EU commission arranged for a coordinated testing programme for horsemeat and banned horse drug phenylbutazonein processed meats. The results of testing, published this week, showed that almost 5 percent of products tested contained horse DNA, pointing to wide-ranging contamination.

Only around 0.5 percent of the equine carcasses tested were found to be contaminated with bute, the Commission said on Tuesday.

Although EU officials and governments said the debacle, which quickly spread across Europe, culminating in raids and the closure of two meat plants in the Netherlands last week, was down to the actions of a few fraudsters, food policy experts countered that horsemeat has revealed the shortcomings and unsustainable nature of the current food system. Karel Williams of Manchester Business School described the scandal as "a 'normal accident'; inevitable sooner or later because it is inherent in system design."   

Commenting on the levels of unlabelled horsemeat detected in the European supply chain, along with low levels of Bute contamination, Health and Consumer Affairs Commissioner Tonio Borg said on Tuesday, "Today's findings have confirmed that this is a matter of food fraud and not of food safety. Restoring the trust and confidence of European consumers and trading partners in our food chain following this fraudulent labelling scandal is now of vital importance for the European economy given that the food sector is the largest single economic sector in the EU."

He added, "In the coming months, the Commission will propose to strengthen the controls along the food chain in line with lessons learned."

In all, 7,259 tests have been carried out across the 27 EU countries since March, when the EU executive launched the DNA testing programme. Commission data shows that, of these, 4,144 tested for the presence of horsemeat DNA and 3,115 for the presence of bute. 193 tests (4.7 percent of those looking for horsemeat) revealed traces of horse DNA.

The results were shared through the EU's new Rapid Alert for Food and Feed system, which is aimed to increase the response time to food safety crises. The Commission estimates the testing programme cost the EU around 2.5 million Euros (£2.1 million).

European health watchdog EFSA and the European Medicines Agency (EMA) both announced on Monday that consumers should not be concerned by the results of bute testing. The organisations said, "on a given day, the probability of a consumer being both susceptible to [ill effects] and being exposed to phenylbutazone was estimated to range approximately from 2 in a trillion to 1 in 100 million."

The Commission will meet on Friday (19th April) to discuss a possible extension of the programme, given the huge impact the food scandal has had on consumer confidence across Europe. In the UK, the board of the Food Standards Agency, which led the response to the crisis, agreed to an independent review of the Agency's handling of the horsemeat scandal during a meeting on Wednesday.

Although the scandal has caused major upsets for supermarkets, as well as meat processors and caterers, some of whom have lost millions of pounds in contracts, local, independent and organic traders have seen tangible benefits from the upheaval. Figures from Kantar Worldpanel showed that in February, at the height of the scandal in Britain, supermarket sales of organic goods rose to their highest level in 9 months, rising 8.4 percent on January levels, and certification body the Soil Association revealed independent organic meat suppliers had reported an increase in sales of up to 20 percent over the same period.