Food Law News - EU - 2001


FSA Scotland Letter, 28 March 2001

CONTAMINANTS - European Commission Regulation (EC) No 466/2001 Setting Maximum Levels for Certain Contaminants in Foodstuffs

The letter is to provide inform people that the above EC Regulation and the allied Directive on sampling and analysis were published in the Official Journal of the European Communities on 16 March. The full references for these documents are as follows:

The English language versions documents are available from the Commission website at: http :1 leuropa .eu .intleu r -/exlenlojlindex .html.

The published texts indicate that the new Regulation (including the new limits for heavy metals and 3-MCPD) and the associated measures in the Directive and Decision will apply from 5 April 2002. However, the Commission has recently informed us that there are errors in the published texts and that the Regulation, Directive and Decision should apply from 8 March 2002 (1 year from adoption) rather than 5 April 2002 as published (1 year from 20 days after publication). The Commission is considering how to address these errors and whether the published dates can be allowed to stand to avoid confusion. We will let you know the outcome of the Commission's consideration as soon as we are informed.

In the previous letter it was mentioned that the limits for lead and cadmium in bivalve molluscs and the limits and species for lead, cadmium and mercury in fish would be reviewed by the Commission Working Group on Contaminants. This review took place on 22 March when a number of proposed revisions were discussed. No revisions were agreed but the Commission asked Member States to send in further data by 22 June for discussion at a further meeting of the Working Group. AUK proposal that a higher limit was appropriate for lead in bivalve molluscs was accepted in principle but the details will be discussed further at the next Working Group meeting in the light of any new data.


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