British pig industry reveals illegal EU pork checks

The British pig industry has announced that is has started checking that pork from illegal European Union farms is not entering the British food chain.

The National Pig Association’s (NPA) ‘Exercise Compliance’ follows the success of its Wall of Fame website, where the UK’s top retailers and brands pledged not to sell pork or pork products from continental farms flouting the European sow stalls ban.

According to the NPA, despite being given ten years’ notice, more than 60 per cent of European Union countries have failed to comply with Europe’s sow stalls ban, which was introduced at the beginning of this year.

NPA, working with the UK government, says it’s determined to stop pork from these lower-welfare farms being sold to unsuspecting British consumers.

Exercise Compliance will involve selecting imported pork products at random and asking the British companies that sell them to trace them back to their farms of origin.

“We believe the British food companies that have made the pledge on our Wall of Fame have conscientiously done what we asked of them, by gaining commitments from their suppliers that only pork from legal farms has been used,” says NPA regions manager Lizzie Press. “But now we want to test those statements by tracing randomly selected packs back to their farms of origin.”

NPA has already visited the Netherlands with retailer Asda to visit two farms that produce pork for the Asda supply chain.

“Although we visited only a representative sample, it was clear both farms were fully compliant with the sow stalls ban and we were satisfied with the farm standards we observed,” adds Press.