Families at risk from toxic imported foods

 Add your view

Families are being put at risk from toxic and cancer risk chemical residues in imported foods

Families are being put at risk from toxic and cancer risk chemical residues in imported foods, it has been claimed. There are concerns that imported chicken, beef, seafood and honey, which are known to be a contamination danger, are getting on to dinner plates. Food campaigners claim this will escalate amid evidence that Britain's testing regime for food imports is being starved of cash by the Government. Separately, a change to the food testing regime, which is due to get the go-ahead on Thursday will make it easier for food firms to avoid being caught and shamed. The allegations come from the organic food and farming group, the Soil Association, which claims public health is being put at risk. Imported foods are not required to go through the same rigorous residues testing regime as those produced in this country. As a result, drugs and disinfectants used to treat farm animals, farmed fish, shellfish, and even beehives can find their way into products on the supermarket shelf. The testing regime is run by the government's Veterinary Residues Committee (VRC), which argues it needs a minimum of £2 million a year to do the job properly. However, the food and farming department, DEFRA, has cut funding from £1 million a year to £900,000. In the current financial year only seven types of imported food are being tested, and three of these for just one drug type. There has been no testing at all of imported eggs, beef, lamb, pork, bacon, milk or butter, and no samples were collected directly from the catering trade. In a separate development, the VRC is expected to bow to pressure from the food industry and pre-announce which imported foods are to be tested and for which chemical residues. The decision is due to be taken at a meeting of the VRC on Thursday. The Soil Association and even some members of the VRC believe this will be much less effective than unannounced spot checks. Food manufacturers and retailers have been "named and shamed" by the VRC in the past following the discovery of illegal chemical residues in their products - both UK produced and imported. Last summer, British farmers called for a ban on beef imports from Brazil following evidence that some producers were using illegal hormones to "pump up" their cattle. In 2002, more than one in ten samples of chicken imported from Thailand and Brazil were found to be contaminated with residues of powerful antibiotics called nitrofurans, which are banned because they are a cancer risk. These included a Buxted brand sold by Tesco, which had to be removed from sale. In 2004, residues of malachite green were found in Morrison's own brand salmon fillets. This is a banned chemical, suspected of being both toxic and a cancer risk. In 2005, a survey of imported honey found chemical contamination, which is likely to have derived from the cap gaskets, in jars from Morrisons, Tesco, Sainsbury, Waitrose, Kwik Save, Holland & Barrett and Dunnes Stores. In 2006, a brand-naming survey of imported prawns was undertaken. The results have not yet been published, however other studies have found residues of nitrofurans. A number of retailers and manufacturers have retaliated against the system of naming and shaming by refusing to hand over the results of their own chemical testing of imported food to the VRC. Soil Association policy adviser, Richard Young, said: "There are real dangers from some residues in food which may cause cancer and other health problems. "The proposal to tell producers in advance which products and drugs will be tested, and which not, is totally unacceptable, because it will put British consumers at greater risk." He added: "The Government has cut funding and the food industry is not cooperating. "We recognise that the VRC is in a very difficult position and attempting to do the best it can in the circumstances. "However, government testing of imports is so woefully inadequate, particularly in the case of food from the catering trade, that the very last thing the committee should do is to give in to pressure. "This would only make it easier for dangerous drugs to enter the food chain undetected."

A spokesman for DEFRA rejected the concerns of the Soil Association.

She said the money available for testing food imports "is sufficient to cover all of the areas that the Veterinary Residues Committee considers priorities".

 

What's on today   What's on tomorrow

Receive our newsletter