Calling plant-based food veggie \u201cburgers\u201d or \u201csausages\u201d may be banned in the UK under the new trade agreement with the EU, the Guardian understands.<\/p>\n
The Labour government secured a new sanitary and phytosanitary<\/a> (SPS) agreement with the EU earlier this year, which allows British businesses to sell products including some burgers and sausages in the EU for the first time since Brexit.<\/p>\n However, the deal ties the UK to some EU laws concerning food labelling, and the EU is set to vote this week on banning the use of \u201cmeaty\u201d terms to describe vegetarian food after lobbying from the livestock industry.<\/p>\n The European parliament voted for this ban last month<\/a>, and this week the European Commission as well as the governments of the 27 member states will decide whether it becomes law.<\/p>\n If it does, the UK government believes that the law will also apply to British businesses. It is understood that the amendment would automatically come into force in the UK were it passed in the EU, and then it would be subject to negotiations, when a specific exemption could be carved out if it was in line with the agreement.<\/p>\n The Food<\/a> Standards Agency is understood to have told stakeholders that UK businesses would be subject to the new EU rules on plant-based labelling, if they were adopted.<\/p>\n The \u201ccommon understanding\u201d<\/a> between the UK and EU, which underpins the deal, states on labelling: \u201cAn exception could only be agreed if: (i) it does not lead to lower standards as compared to EU rules, (ii) it does not negatively affect EU goods being placed on the market in the UK.\u201d Government sources said these clauses would be undermined if a labelling ban took place in the EU and was not adopted in the UK.<\/p>\n A government spokesperson told the Guardian that ministers had made a choice to align in some areas where it made sense to do so in the national interest, but that details remained subject to negotiations.<\/p>\n \u2018A sausage is a sausage. Sausage is not vegan,\u2019 the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, has said. Photograph: Jenner Images\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Joel Scott-Halkes, the head of campaigns at WePlanet, said: \u201cThe only confusion over plant-based food labelling in Europe is exactly which shadowy livestock lobby is behind it. There\u2019s no genuine, citizen-driven demand to ban veggie burgers or sausages \u2013 just a meat industry push to protect its profit margins from a rising tide of dietary change.\u201d<\/p>\n The proposed law change has been controversial in Europe. The supermarkets Aldi and Lidl, Burger King and the sausage producer R\u00fcgenwalder M\u00fchle said in a joint open letter that banning \u201cfamiliar terms\u201d would make it \u201cmore difficult for consumers to make informed decisions\u201d.<\/p>\n The labelling ban has been supported by the French meat industry, and a similar proposal has been discussed by the Italian government. The German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, has said: \u201cA sausage is a sausage. Sausage is not vegan.\u201d<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The planet’s most important stories. Get all the week’s environment news – the good, the bad and the essential<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n The French centre-right MEP C\u00e9line Imart drafted the amendment to legislation intended to strengthen the position of farmers in the food supply chain.<\/p>\n Imart, who is also a cereals farmer in north-west France, said: \u201cA steak, an escalope or a sausage are products from our livestock, not laboratory art nor plant products. There is a need for transparency and clarity for the consumer and recognition for the work of our farmers.\u201d<\/p>\n Riley Jackson, the associate director of commercial at the cultivated meat company Ivy Farm Technologies, said: \u201cConsumers today are savvy and capable of making informed choices. We\u2019ve had black bean burgers and veggie sausages on shelves for decades \u2013 formats people know, love, and thus understand how to cook.<\/p>\n \u201cAt a time when our farming communities are under immense pressure \u2013 with 51% of UK farmers considering leaving the industry \u2013 we should be welcoming solutions that could increase revenue streams to farmers, not blocking them with red tape that has nothing to do with safety or consumer awareness. Let\u2019s focus on raising all boats by building a strong food system, not building barriers.\u201d<\/p>\n A government spokesperson said: \u201cWe are focused on delivering an SPS deal that could add up to \u00a35.1bn a year to our economy by cutting costs and reducing red tape for British growers, producers and retailers. We will not comment on hypothetical scenarios or speculation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Calling plant-based food veggie \u201cburgers\u201d or \u201csausages\u201d may be banned in the UK under the new trade agreement…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":590284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5226],"tags":[802,748,2000,299,5187,1699,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-590283","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brexit","8":"tag-brexit","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-eu","11":"tag-europe","12":"tag-european","13":"tag-european-union","14":"tag-great-britain","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115603372965716118","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=590283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/590284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=590283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=590283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=590283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}