Raising Valid Beefs About
Meat Testing
The Globe and Mail
Lead Editorial
November 21, 2000
Given the poisonous political history between Canada and the European
Union over beef exports, it would be easy to dismiss a new EU report on
Canadian beef as mere propaganda.
That would be a mistake. Whatever the politics, the report by experts from the Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) of the EU's Health and Consumer Protection Directorate-General should be reviewed for the sober, scientific advice it offers on Canadian meat monitoring.
A group of FVO officials visited Canada between Sept. 19 and Sept. 29 to study Canada's system for monitoring residues of drugs such as hormones and antibiotics in meat. Staff from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency accompanied the European team to a variety of sites, including a horse feedlot, a cattle feedlot and three testing laboratories.
The report's findings are not reassuring. In general, the Europeans found there was little monitoring, poor data collection, poor laboratory testing and, especially upsetting, little follow-up when problems were detected.
For example, the report says, Canada tests relatively few carcasses for drug residues compared with Europe, and this shortfall greatly reduces the odds of detecting a violation. If European drug-testing standards were applied to beef, 6,757 carcasses would be tested at slaughterhouses this year instead of about 800.
The report says the computer database for tracking Canada's tests and violations was not working properly, and says Canadian officials were unable to provide a summary test report for 1999-2000, the fiscal year that ended March 31.
The EU team asked for evidence of follow-up investigations when violations were found, but says none could be provided. The team discovered that drug violations detected in one sample of horse meat were never investigated, and no other horses from the same owner were tested.
Europe bans the use of hormones in beef production, and has banned the import of Canadian beef raised with hormones -- hormones that Canadian regu- lators consider safe as long as they are not present in the raw meat. Since Europe still accepts beef raised without hormones, the officials also reviewed Canada's small program for raising and monitoring hormone-free beef.
They found deficiencies in that hormone-free program as well. For example, tiny amounts of hormone were detected in a number of the 15 urine samples tested last year, but they were not reported to the EU or to Canadian regulators. (The Canadian regulators deny the tests showed the presence of hormones.) No urine-testing samples have been taken from the animals since last year because testing equipment has been broken -- even though Canada assured the EU after an inspection visit in 1998 that urine sampling would be undertaken.
The inspection team also found a fresh, empty box of hormones at a cattle feedlot that claimed to have stopped using hormones in June, 1999. The feedlot operator later turned over a stock of hormones to the visitors.
These and many other findings of inadequate monitoring should not be ignored simply because Canada is embroiled in an 11-year political battle over beef exports to Europe. Even if Canadians and Europeans disagree about the safety of hormone and drug use in animals, we should be concerned to learn that our monitoring system is flawed.
If we are going to allow hormones in cattle, we have to be absolutely certain they are not detected in the raw meat after slaughter. It is the only remaining line of defence, and one that should be far better patrolled than this report indicates.