Dairy Firms Face Crisis Over EU Safety Checks
UK - The dairy industry faced a crisis last night after the European Commission expressed "concerns" about the methods that Britain's food safety watchdog used to detect harmful levels of antibiotics in milk.
26 April 2007
1 minute read
Brussels said it would be sending a team of veterinary and food safety experts to Britain next month to carry out a nationwide inspection of the dairy sector.
Bowland Dairy Products has been accused of using contaminated milk
The commission said it had acted after a random inspection by EU experts of a small Lancashire cheesemakers, Bowland Dairy Products, found "serious breaches of EU food safety rules".
It painted a graphic picture of breaches at Bowland, saying that the inspection found evidence that the firm had collected out-of-date milk from retail operations and used mouldy and contaminated cheese, including floor waste, to vacuum-pack products for sale.
The firm is also accused of using raw milk containing antibiotic residues or contaminated with substances such as dyes and detergents.
Bowland, which employs 22 people, produces 2,000 tons of curd cheese a year, all of which is exported to the Continent to be turned into processed cheese.
Source: Telegraph
