New horse meat scandal; meat sold as beef came from dozens of horses used by a French pharmaceutical firm.

New horse meat scandal hits Holland, meat sold as beef came from dozens of horses used by a French pharmaceutical firm.HT: Telegraph.

The Dutch food authorities have issued an official recall for up to 11,000 kilos (24,000lb) of horse meat that was illegally sold as beef in Holland last year.

The horse meat came from 200 slaughtered animals originating in equestrian riding centres, pharmaceutical laboratories and private owners in France and entered the food chain at the height of an international scandal in 2013.

Included in the fraud was meat from dozens of horses that were used by a French pharmaceutical firm, Sanofi Pasteur, to develop serums against rabies and other diseases.

The meat, unfit for human consumption and accompanied by fake documents labelling it as beef, was delivered to five Dutch companies via Belgium between January and October last year.

The latest fraud involving 200 horse carcases was only discovered on 27 Dec 2013 after an investigation by officials from the Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA).Read the full story here. 

The 'Origin of species' in a burger? Romanian Donkey Meat In UK "Beef" Burgers.

The 'Origin of species' in a burger? Romanian Donkey Meat In UK "Beef" Burgers.(TI).

A law banning horses from Romanian roads may be responsible for the surge in the fraudulent sale of horsemeat on the European beef market, a French politician said yesterday.

Horse-drawn carts were a common form of transport for centuries in Romania, but hundreds of thousands of the animals are feared to have been sent to the abattoir after the change in road rules.
The law, which was passed six years ago but only enforced recently, also banned carts drawn by donkeys, leading to speculation among food-industry officials in France that some of the “horse meat” which has turned up on supermarket shelves in Britain, France and Sweden may, in fact, turn out to be donkey meat. 
“Horses have been banned from Romanian roads and millions of animals have been sent to the slaughterhouse,” said Jose Bove, a veteran campaigner for small farmers who is now vice-president of the European Parliament agriculture committee.
After a couple of days in which the horse meat affair was seen as a largely British problem, the scandal began to be taken seriously by French politicians and newspapers over the weekend.
...
It came from abattoirs in Romania through a dealer in Cyprus working through another dealer in Holland to a meat plant in the south of France which sold it to a French-owned factory in Luxembourg which made it into frozen meals sold in supermarkets in 16 countries.
Meanwhile, legal action over the horse meat scandal is to be mounted in Europe, Environment Secretary Owen Paterson has said as he described the contamination of beef products as a case of fraud against the public.

repeated his rejection of calls for a ban on meat imports, saying that the Food Standards Agency (FSA) advice was that all products on sale are safe for consumption.
"This is a case of fraud and a conspiracy against the public, this is a criminal action, substituting one material for another," he told BBC Breakfast in answer to questioning about calls for a ban on meat imports.Hmmm.....It wouldn't surprise me if Muslims were involved to make it 'halal' but i don't think we'll read this in the MSM.Read the full story here.