European countries may introduce mandatory labeling for meat in restaurants.

EU countries demand mandatory labeling of meat origin in restaurants

Member states of the European Union are increasingly demanding that restaurants indicate the country of origin of the meat they serve to their customers. The European Commission is considering making this rule mandatory across the EU. This was reported by G4Food.

The latest country to implement mandatory labeling of meat origin in restaurants is Sweden. The European Commission is considering adopting a similar rule at the EU level as part of agriculture.

EU legislation requires that the meat sold has an indication of the country of origin, but there is no such obligation for meat served in restaurants.

Several EU countries have already independently implemented the obligation to indicate the origin of meat. For example, since 2019, Slovakia has had an obligation to indicate the origin of meat, and Finland has also made a similar decision. Restaurants have expressed concerns about administrative difficulties, but a compromise was found: if indicating the origin on the menu is inconvenient, the information must be available on an information board or upon customer request.

In Estonia, a draft law on mandatory labeling of meat origin in restaurants was recently published, while the French government removed a decree that made it mandatory to indicate the origin of meat.

It is worth noting that Israeli biotechnologists have developed a bioreactor for producing artificial meat, which allows for cost reduction by increasing cell density and avoiding expensive components. Such meat costs the same as organic chicken meat from farms in the USA.