Ireland has received a thumbs up from the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) for its control systems for pesticide residues in foodstuffs of plant origin.

TB reactor numbers and herd incidence have continued to fall in 2011, according to Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney.

MIXED results continue in EU audits of Brazil’s production of beef for export to the EU.

CATTLE farmers who use a high level of replacement cattle ear tags will be more likely to be visited for cross-compliance checks, as part of the Department of Agriculture’s response to findings by the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office’s (FVO) inspection of the Irish beef traceability system.

TRACEABILITY of beef and beef products has improved significantly since 2002, said officials from the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) in last week’s report of their inspection in Ireland last September.

NO significant deficiencies were identified regarding the application of compulsory beef labelling requirements.

BRAZILIAN beef is still not meeting the same standards as those in the European Union, it was claimed yesterday.

THE Irish Farmers Association (IFA) has claimed that a new European Union report is a damning indictment of Brazilian beef auditing and traceability.

Marts: The timing and outcome of inspection of beef-producing farms in Brazil by the EU Food and Veterinary Organisation holds one of the critical keys to the impact of the ban on delivering higher returns to producers in this country.

PRESSURE for a total ban on Brazilian beef imports to the European Union mounted yesterday after the findings of the latest veterinary investigation into production systems in the South American country were published.

IFA could have a long wait for the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office report on last March’s inspection of Brazil’s beef exports to the EU.

THE European Commission yesterday rejected claims by the Irish Farmers’ Association that it had covered up a report on issues relating to Brazilian beef exports.

A SIT-IN protest by members of the Irish Farmers Association was continuing at the European Commission offices in Dublin late last night.

MUCH progress has been made in Brazil’s control of residues and contaminants in animal products, said the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office in last week’s report of a 10-day inspection mission in Brazil at the start of March.

TWO follow-up inspections early next year by the EU’s Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) will monitor food export standards in Brazil.

YOU’RE on your own if you risk eating food imported into the EU from Brazil.

THE latest European Union Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) report on Brazilian beef production confirms the findings of a recent IFA investigation, the farm body claimed yesterday.

I WAS appalled to hear that South American beef was championed during a cookery item on a RTÉ television programme aired recently