Feed Taint Crisis Hits Beef

There was confusion this morning as it emerged that eight cattle herds in Northern Ireland have been fed contaminated feed from the Irish Republic.

Adding fuel to the fire over an ongoing scare over pork products, the BBC this morning was reporting that the Food Standards Agency (FSA) had been forced to reassure consumers by saying that all the farms concerned had been put under restriction, so that no animals from them will go to slaughter.

However, the FSA's Maria Jennings said she "cannot rule out that beef from those herds has gone into the food chain".

While insisting that beef on sale in NI "was entirely safe", she did admit that there was a chance of contaminants in beef, but said this would be much lower than in pork.

Ms Jennings said cattle would be fed a variety of feeds as they are not as intensively reared as pigs and the way they break down food was different, making the risk of infection much lower.

Also this morning, the Northern Ireland Minister for Agriculture and Rural Development Minister, Michelle Gildernew, was grilled over her department's handling of the whole crisis in a live BBC Radio Ulster interview.

She was asked to clarify how pork that is due to come back onto the shelves again soon is regarded as 'safe' when almost a dozen local premises have processed pork from the Republic recently.

Last night, Stormont Health Minister Michael McGimpsey also said members of the public had been left "confused" following a "lack of clarity" on the pork contamination scare.

Mr McGimpsey said: "I realise that there has been a lack of clarity about advice on the consumption of pork and pork products. In the Republic of Ireland, all pork products which originated from the Republic and from Northern Ireland have been removed from shelves.

"Yet, in Northern Ireland, initial advice from the FSA to the public here has been not to eat these products, but no formal recall notice has been sent to retailers. Despite this advice, a number of retailers have already taken the decision to remove products from their shelves until they are certain that none of them are contaminated."

See: NI Pork Processing Resumes