FSA Letter (OCR 005), 1 April, 2009
For a copy of the pdf file containing this letter and the draft Regulation, see: FSA Letter and Draft EU Regulation
Further to my letter of 18 March [For news item, see 18 March 2009], I am writing to let you know that the above Regulation received a favourable opinion by the Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health (SCoFCAH) at its meeting on 27 March. I also wanted to let you know about next steps.
SCoFCAH meeting
A further revised text of the draft Regulation was presented – see Appendix 1. This has been amended to address some linguistic and legal points and to include text proposed by the UK to clarify the provisions for control of consignments that are moved away from the designated point of entry pending the outcome of physical checks.
Some Member States, including the UK, made the point that decisions about which products should be subject to the provisions in the Regulation must be evidence-based and must be guided by established criteria. This will help to avoid unnecessary and disproportionate burdens for the competent authorities and for the feed/food industries. The Commission, therefore, gave an undertaking to work with Member States to develop guidelines on this and to review the current list of products in the Regulation before the application date. Given this, the UK voted in favour. The majority of other Member States also supported the text and a favourable opinion was given by the Committee.
Next Steps and further information
The draft Regulation will now be subject to European Parliament scrutiny prior to formal adoption, and it is anticipated that the date of application will be 1 January 2010. In the meantime, the Agency will be developing plans for giving effect to the Regulation at national level. We will keep stakeholders informed about this and also about the development of the Commission guidelines mentioned above.