Reuters | October 20, 1999
LONDON - Scientists working for the British government have questioned the EU's reasons for its ban on hormone growth promoters in beef after studying the first part of an EU risk assessment, the farm ministry said.
"Independent scientific advisers in the UK have concluded that the scientific evidence in a recent EU report does not support the Community ban," the ministry said in a statement.
But Britain would continue to implement the ban on the use of hormones and on the import of beef from animals treated with the hormones, it said.
"The ban has always been fully implemented in the UK and it will continue to be so until EC (European Union) legislation is changed," farm minister Nick Brown said.
The EU's beef hormone ban has caused a decade-long dispute with the U.S., culminating during the summer in the U.S. and Canada receiving World Trade Organisation clearance to impose 100 percent duties on nearly $125 million of EU goods.
The EU had missed a May 13 deadline to drop the ban.
The use of hormonal growth promoters has been banned in the European Union since 1988 and imports of hormone-treated meat or animals are prohibited, the ministry said.
"The UK opposed this ban on the grounds that there was no scientific evidence to justify its imposition," the ministry said.
An evaluation of scientific evidence on the safety of hormonal growth promoters was carried out by a sub-group of the independent Veterinary Products Committee, the ministry said.
It considered evidence from a report of the EU's Scientific Committee on Veterinary Measures Relating to Public Health (SCVPH). The SCVPH Report was the first part of an EU risk assessment which relates to the EU ban on the use of growth hormones and the importation of meat from treated cattle.
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