First of all, I would like to reassure the Assembly that the Executive is taking prompt, effective and joined-up action to deal with this matter. We take our joint responsibility for food safety very seriously. Primary responsibility rests, of course, with the Food Standards Agency which is a non governmental organisation tasked with regulating Food standards and is outside my remit. But from the outset, I have kept in close contact with Health Minister, Michael McGimpsey to offer him advice from DARD’s perspective, and ensure he was fully apprised of the information my Department received from its counterparts in Dublin. We have also ensured good links with the Dublin authorities, and I spoke to DAFF Minister Brendan Smith on Sunday, and he updated me on the rationale for the decision taken by the Dublin authorities.
At official level, staff have been liaising closely with officials in the Food Standards Agency, Invest NI, and the Departments of Health and Enterprise, Trade and Investment. There was also frequent contact with representatives of the farming and meat processing industries over the weekend.
It may be helpful if I explain to the House in more detail what we have been doing as regards the implications for producers and processors. As soon as we were informed about the potential contamination, we restricted 6 affected herds on APHIS, the Department’s animal traceability system. We also put a marker on APHIS to alert meat inspection staff if animals from those affected herds were presented for slaughter. We also spoke to the Food Standards Agency to share information and advice.
During Saturday night and Sunday, I had a number of discussions with my Chief Veterinary Officer and Senior DARD officials to take advice and gather further information as events developed. On Sunday, Veterinary staff spoke to the Northern Ireland Meat Exporters Association about the implications for them. We undertook to notify NIMEA if we discovered that their members had slaughtered any animals from the affected premises.
Today we carried out tracings on animals that were being sent to slaughter, and we notified affected meat plants. The Department is closely liaising with slaughter premises to identify if any animals from the identified premises in the South may have been slaughtered here since 1 September 2008. The Department has taken samples from these premises to check if there is any contamination. Within my Department, my Permanent Secretary is chairing a group of senior officials, including the Chief Veterinary Officer, to oversee our response to the situation. We take this matter very seriously. I believe that we are responding both proactively and proportionately.
The FSA advice is to recall and destroy pork products from the South and take northern products off the shelves, hold and investigate until more information is available. Advice to consumers remains not to consume pork produced here or in the South. The advice for retailers and wholesalers is that they should for the moment retain any pork product, thus not letting the product enter the food chain, until the Food Standards Agency determines the way forward.
I am very conscious of and concerned about the implications for producers and processors. Inevitably, processors will not want to slaughter animals when it is not clear whether or not the meat can be put forward into the food chain or what the demand from consumers will be. But for producers, there are serious issues around the keeping of animals beyond the point at which they expected to send them to market. So there may well be future welfare implications. The Department and the Executive will need to urgently consider how we can help the industry through this difficult time.
We are aware that the authorities in the South have taken pre emptive measures to remove potentially contaminated product from the food chain. However, FSA consider it is premature to come to any decisions on the need for this in the North until it has more information.
I recognise this is a severe blow to the industry especially in these difficult economic times and also at Christmas when the demand for products, such as ham, and bacon, is normally very high. However, at this time I can assure you that I will do everything I can to support the FSA and restore consumer confidence in our food sector.
This is a fast developing situation, and we are having to respond to it. It represents a huge challenge to an important industry, and it is vital that we all work together. I will be meeting Executive Colleagues later today and will discuss this issue. I also expect to call a meeting with industry representatives in the next day or two to further brief them and discuss the way forward.”
Notes to Editors:
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