Claudia Ciobanu
BUCHAREST, Aug 28 2007 (IPS) – Romania was hoping to put an end this year to a ban on pork exports to the European Union (EU), but several swine pest outbreaks at the farms of U.S. company Smithfield will cause the interdiction to be prolonged for at least two more years.
Romania joined the EU Jan. 1 this year. Although free movement of goods is a basic functioning principle of the union, the European Commission, the executive arm of the EU, decided to maintain, even after Romania #39s integration, a ban on Romanian pork exports in place since 2004.
The interdiction was introduced because several outbreaks of swine pest had been discovered in the country, and European officials wanted to prevent the virus from spreading.
Swine fever is a highly contagious viral disease transmitted through trade in live animals and fresh meat products. Contaminated hogs die in less than three months. There is no treatment for the disease, and infected swine are culled.
The EU decided to maintain the export ban even after January because, in spite of vaccination campaigns, they were not persuaded the virus had been eliminated.
Romanian authorities estimate the country loses around 200 million euro yearly because of the ban. In July, Romanian officials announced successful eradication of the disease and called for new negotiations with the EU for lifting of the interdiction.
But in the first week of August, new threads of the virus were discovered at two swine farms (Igris and Cenei) in Timis county, roughly 500km northwest of capital Bucharest. Both farms belong to U.S. company Smithfield.
One of the largest meat producers in the world, Smithfield entered Romania in 2004. Smithfield predicts that Romania will become Europe #39s leading food producer in the years ahead, Michael Cole, vice-president of Smithfield Inc. declared at the time. Our goal is to create the leading pork company in Romania and to prepare it to be a major player in the European market when Romania joins the EU.
Smithfield currently owns over 30 farms in Romania, raising approximately 400,000 pigs. They plan to invest over one billion dollars in the country.
In a speech on U.S. Independence Day this year (Jul. 4), Romanian President Traian Basescu thanked Smithfield for helping us raise our pigs the American way. Former agriculture minister Ilie Sarbu, during whose mandate Smithfield entered Romania, praised the company #39s farms, saying that pigs are being kept and transported in NASA conditions.
But this is not what the sanitary authorities discovered when they inspected Smithfield farms after the August outbreaks. Zoltan Nagy, president of the National Agency for Environmental Protection, declared that Igris farm had been opened abusively, without an environmental authorisation, and was overpopulated, keeping double the allowed number of pigs.
An investigation conducted by the National Sanitary-Veterinary Authority, whose results were made public Aug. 8, revealed that, out of the 25 farms Smithfield owns in Timis county, only 11 had received an authorisation to operate.
The method of industrial hog-raising employed by Smithfield is considered one of the most cruel, as it combines minimal costs with maximum exploitation of the animals, writes the website of CEE Bankwatch Network, a group of NGOs monitoring the activities of corporations in Central and Eastern Europe. The animals are kept in congested buildings, where the level of noise is approximately 90 decibels and the air is full of toxic gases. Veterinary regulations are often violated.
On Nov. 4, 2004, Anna Roggenbuck from Polish Green Network declared in a press release issued by Bankwatch: Bearing in mind the revelations in Poland that Smithfield #39s operations have violated Polish environmental law, the Polish Green Network advises Romanian citizens and environmentalists to be vigilant. We will continue to monitor Smithfield farms as we know most of them continue to operate without permission under the EU Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Directive.
The company has been accused of not adhering to environmental legislation in the U.S. too. According to United Food and Commercial Workers, the company was fined 12.6 million dollars in 1997 by the Environmental Protection Agency for 7,000 violations of the Clean Water Act and the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System.
In October last year, Romanian NGO TERRA Millenium III issued a study about the dangers of Smithfield practices entitled #39Industrial Pig Farms and Their Environmental Impacts: Case Study of Smithfield in Romania #39. According to Bankwatch, TERRA Millenium III sounded an alarm signal against Smithfield #39s expansion to Romania already in July 2005, invoking the corporation #39s negative history.
We have warned the Timis county authorities of the practices used by Smithfield in the U.S. and Poland, executive director of TERRA Millenium III Ionut Apostol told IPS. The company probably received a warm welcome in the country because they knew who to bribe, both on the local level and in Bucharest.
In response to requests for comment from IPS, the press office of Smithfield Romania emailed a press release in which they confirm a new outbreak at one of their farms (Igris 1).
The company said all measures to exterminate and incinerate the contaminated pigs had been taken at all three farms. Smithfield also pointed out that between January and June this year, more than 160 such outbreaks have been reported, none in industrial exploitations.
The corporation made the point that they are therefore not the only ones responsible for any extension of the EU ban. However, the 160 outbreaks mentioned took place before the Romanian government declared the disease cleared in July.
