FSIS Should 'Immediately' Stop Imports of Meat From Australia, Advocacy Group Says
The Food Safety and Inspection Service should immediately revoke its finding for Australia’s meat export inspection regime -- effectively ending the country’s eligibility to export meat to the U.S. -- after finding contaminants in samples of meat imports from Australia, Food and Water Watch said in a recent letter to the agency.
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Documents uncovered in a Freedom of Information Act request by the advocacy group “show an alarming increase in safety violations of Australian meat imports, in particular mutton, lamb, and goat meat that was contaminated with fecal matter and digestive contents,” Food and Water Watch said Oct. 27 in a press release. “The incidents raise serious questions about the public health risks of relying on Australia’s heavily privatized meat inspection system.”
Reports obtained in the request show 19 instances wherein shipments from Australia were refused by FSIS in 2019 and 2020 for reasons deemed “zero-tolerance” by the agency, Food and Water Watch said in its letter. “These are violations that FSIS personnel detected after the imported meat had already undergone the purportedly U.S.-equivalent [Australian Export Meat Inspection System] inspection.”
That’s especially alarming because FSIS only reinspects a small percentage of imports, “which means that the documented incidents are likely a massive undercount of the amount of contaminated meat that ends up imported and likely onto consumers’ plates,” the advocacy group’s press release said.
FSIS should act now on a petition submitted by Food and Water Watch in 2014 to revoke the agency’s equivalency determination, the letter said. “Given Australian meat’s large and increasing number of zero tolerance violations, FWW urges FSIS to add this supplemental information to Citizen’s Petition No. 14-03 as grounds for immediately revoking the equivalency determination for AEMIS,” it said. FSIS didn't comment.