Safety Issues Hurting Beef and Meat Products Consumption in EU

Food & Drink Weekly, March 26, 2001

Concerns about eating beef started last year with an outbreak of mad-cow disease in Britain. The recent foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) epidemic has done little to restore consumer confidence in Europe's meat supply, even though FMD does not threaten human health.

FMD in the United Kingdom, France and the Netherlands has exacerbated the situation in the EU, which already had seen mad cow concerns hurting beef sales, according to USDA. The mad cow "crisis in Europe has significantly reduced retail beef sales, with winter 2000 beef sales falling by as much as 25 to 40 percent in certain European countries," USDA said in a livestock and poultry trade report.

USDA projected EU beef consumption at 5.9 million tonnes in 2001, a significant drop from last year's 6.9 million tonnes. EU beef production was estimated at 6.76 million tonnes in 2001, a decrease of 7 percent from the previous year. Beef consumption in the EU will likely plummet by 15 percent this year amid consumer wariness over outbreaks of mad cow and FMD, USDA said March 21.

Despite the troubles facing EU's livestock industry, the United States was "not expected to see significant export gains as a result." The USDA said U.S. exports are expected to hold nearly steady, rising only slightly from 1.14 million tonnes in 2000 to 1.16 million tonnes this year.

Reduced meat production and safety concerns about European beef could open markets for farm-raised fish from the United States, reports the California Farm Bureau Federation (CFBF). Traditionally, Europe has not been much of a market for American fish, noted the CFBF. However, USDA says European countries may look to farm-raised fish as an alternative source of protein.