The EU Commissioner, Mr David Byrne, called on the US and other trading nations to lift their blanket ban on EU farm products now that foot-and-mouth disease is on the wane.
Speaking after an EU farm ministers' meeting in Brussels yesterday, Mr Byrne, Health and Consumer Protection Commissioner, said such bans dating back to mid-March were no longer justified.
"Now that there's a considerable falling-off of instances, it seems to me appropriate to address this thing on a more fundamental basis," he told reporters.
Last Thursday the US Agriculture Secretary, Ms Ann Veneman, said Washington would move "fairly soon" on replacing its EU-wide ban with restrictions on products from precisely defined regions.
In his report to the farm ministers, Mr Byrne said the cost of the foot-and-mouth crisis could range "from 500 million to over 700 million euros" ($433.2 million to $606.5 million).
He suggested that the epidemic was in its final stages, with the number of daily outbreaks in Britain, where 98 percent of all cases were reported, having dropped to low single figures.
"The outbreak has been eradicated in France and Ireland," he said, while in the Netherlands, where only a few districts have been affected, "the signs are very good that it has been beaten".
Yesterday British officials turned their attention to the Settle area of north Yorkshire, where 16 cases have been reported since May 10th.
"We are taking this very seriously," said the government's chief veterinary officer, Mr Jim Scudamore.
Blood and tissue samples from a year-old bullock found at Clonaslee, Co Laois, were sent to the Pirbright laboratory as a precautionary measure yesterday.
Meanwhile, restrictions were lifted on a Carlow meat factory and farm after results from a sheep with lesions were found to be negative.