New regulations on food safety will simplify the complex requirements currently scattered over 17 directives under a new European Food Safety Authority, the EU Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection has said.
"A whole range of Commission proposals have been made, or are in the legislative process, covering the whole spectrum of food-related issues - food hygiene, food supplements and GM foods amongst others," Mr Byrne said.
The commissioner was the keynote speaker at the Euro-Toques Food Forum in Brook Lodge, Macreddin, Co Wicklow.
Euro-Toques, or the European Community of Cooks, is a 2,500- strong organisation of chefs throughout Europe and is committed to protecting the quality and flavour of local, naturally produced foods.
"We have taken on board the lessons learned from the food crises of the 1990s," Mr Byrne told the forum, "and are laying the groundwork for filling the gaps in current legislation and enhancing food safety throughout the food chain."
The chief executive of the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, Dr Patrick Wall, warned that while strict regulations were considered necessary to ensure equal standards and facilitate trade within the single market, for small companies with a limited distribution a degree of "common sense in enforcement" was required.
"Making compliance easier may not be sufficient to ensure the survival of the artisan and traditional food businesses as the market-place becomes ever more competitive and the big eat the small and the fast eat the slow."
A chronology of food-related problems, culminating in BSE, had damaged consumer confidence and propelled food safety to the top of the political agenda, Dr Wall said. "Some artisan and traditional food producers consider that the ensuing pan food chain regulatory response is increasing he cost of compliance and threatening their very viability."
This view was expressed at a recent Bord Bia symposium in Kinsale for traditional and artisan food producers. The Food Safety Authority and An Bord Bia had conducted a postal survey afterwards, which showed most respondents considered food safety regulations should be proportional to the risks associated with the particular business and that a blanket approach made little sense.
The cost of complying with food- safety legislation was a hurdle which could be overcome, the survey said, but the combined effect of employment, health and safety and waste-management regulations, as well as insurance requirements, was onerous. Start-up companies in particular saw compliance with food regulations as a major hurdle.