PA News | October 22, 1999 | By Geoff Meade, PA News European Editor, Brussels
France was exposed today as a nation which has routinely and illegally been using animal waste - and probably human waste - in animal feesdstuffs.
In a shock report based on an 'urgent veterinary mission' to France by European Commission officials, Paris was given a fortnight to produce an action plan to clean up its act.
The finding were greeted as 'amazing' by a UK government spokesman today.
And they will add to the fury of British farmers over French insistence that British beef could still pose a threat to consumer health.
The conclusions undermine French claims to be upholders of health and safety standards.
And although the worst of the practices revealed in the 15-page report have been stopped, the commission is demanding reassurances and concrete evidence that sufficient action is being taken.
The report outlines how its official mission to France monitored controls on sewage sludge at rendering plants and studied the use of sludge collected from waste water disposal systems.
It declares: "The mission identified deficiencies in the prohibition of certain substances in the production of feeding stuff.
"Certain plants in the French rendering industry have used for years prohibited substances such as sludge from the biological treatment of the waste water or water from septic tanks from their own establishments or, possibly, from their suppliers.
"It is still not fully clear if and how the French authorities controlled the segregation between human waste and industrial waste in the waste water disposal system and the subsequent recycling by the rendering plants."
Elsewhere the report emphasises: "The segregation between human waste and industrial waste in the waste water disposal system was not always present."
