Brazilian poultry refused entry by key international markets
The rejections were made after discovering a serious risk of salmonella in the imported chicken during April-June 2018.
According to food recall expert business Stericycle Expert Solutions, four of the refusals came from the UK and the Netherlands, while two came from Germany.
Brazil has been aiming to resurrect its trust for its meats into the key international market following an investigation into Brazilian meat firm BRF over an alleged cover-up of salmonella in its plants and laboratories.
The investigation led to the European Commission blocking all poultry imports from Brazil, which had been appealed by the South American country to the World Trade Organization in April.
Farzad Henareh, vice president of Stericycle Expert Solutions’ commercial and business development, believes the latest findings have shown that serious risk remains and will not help Brazil’s fight to trade.
“Brazil has been lobbying the European Union for months, trying in vain to get the restrictions around poultry and meat exports lifted to bring the industry back to equilibrium,” said Henareh.
“The silver lining for both supermarkets and consumers is that meat products rejected at the border, due to presenting a serious risk to consumers, will not make it onto our dinner plates. And as we move towards a potentially hard Brexit, we have to ensure that we have a robust system in place to prevent dangerous meat from making it into the UK.”
The European Commission revealed that there were 110,763 tonnes of poultry and meat imported from Brazil in the period from January to May 2018, down 42% from the same period in 2017.
