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Meat-compost safety to be put under review
Government agencies have agreed to review the evidence that says it is safe to compost meat, blood and feathers, and spread the results on farmland.
The review is a response to concerns – highlighted in the Yorkshire Post – about the risk of spreading foot and mouth and other diseases.
The growing business of on-farm composting is a particular problem around Holme upon Spalding Moor and the Yorkshire Post reported last November on residents' complaints about the smell and some farmers' concerns about the risks.
The report revealed that the food accreditation body Quality Meat Scotland (QMS) had told farmers to avoid allowing livestock to graze on land treated with compost from animal by-products.
QMS also had concerns about garden waste, which might include poisonous plants. But its refusal to accept Defra assurances about the low risk of animal disease from animal by-products was the political bombshell in its decision.
Defra relies on a mathematical risk analysis produced by a single scientist in 2002 – when the Government was looking for another way of dealing with waste food which would once have gone into pig-swill.
Critics said Defra was too quick to embrace the findings, which failed to account for the many variables in real life.
Now Charlotte Maltin, a scientific advisor to Quality Meat Scotland, has explained why it still thinks it was right to be cautious. Writing in the National Beef Association's journal she points out several ways in which Defra's estimated odds against disease could be reduced dramatically.
And she reveals that QMS and other organisations have been talking to "a range of governmental bodies and agencies to try to resolve the major concerns".
Defra referred inquiries to the Waste and Resources Action Programme, which in a statement said it held a meeting in May in response to industry concerns.
The original author of the 2002 animal by-products risk assessment was presented to a range of stakeholders from the farming and composting industry, quality assurance schemes, Government agencies and departments.
Those present accepted the findings from the 2002 assessment were valid but it was agreed to repeat the original analysis using the latest data, which was not available in 2002. This repeat work has been commissioned.
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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