Welsh farmers join protest over Brazilian beef
Following a sit in protest made by Irish farmers over Brazilian beef imports last month, welsh farmers have now joined the protest, calling for a ban on all imports from the South American country.
NFU Cymru president Dai Davies has called on the EU Commission to consider banning imports of beef from Brazil, in the light of further reports of “serious breaches in cattle identification regulations in a country where foot and mouth disease is endemic.”
He added, “Livestock farmers across Wales have just endured four months of misery as we have complied with the strictest animal movement and bio-security regime imaginable, at a cost of tens of millions of pounds, in order to satisfy the EU veterinary authorities that our beef, lamb and pork can safely be allowed back into international trade. Had our precautions, and in particular our arrangements for tracking and verifying the movement of livestock, been found wanting in the slightest particular, it would have set back the timetable for the lifting of trade restrictions by months. Yet now we understand a very different set of rules applies to our main competitors, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, in Brazil.”
The call for a ban came just a day before Brazilian beef exporters opened a London office for the Brazilian Beef Information Service (BBIS) in order to mount their first sustained promotional campaign of Brazilian beef in the UK in an attempt to counteract what it believes to be misleading arguments made by British and Irish farmers over the safety of Brazilian beef.
