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In recent months, the European institutions have agreed on the text of the directive, which also regulates the occurrence of dual quality food and products in the EU single market. Under the Directive, the sale of food products of different composition with the same packaging within different Member States is a misleading (not prohibited) commercial practice. Any penalties should be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. Czech MEP Kateřina Konečná (GUE / NGL) considers the final version of the directive to be a victory for the food sector over the Member States; in her opinion, products with the same packaging but with different composition in the EU single market should be banned. According to Konečná, the occurrence of dual quality in the single market is a serious problem without being adequately addressed at the moment. According to Polish MEP Róży Thun und Hohenstein (EPP), who is also Vice-Chair of the IMCO Committee, the adopted wording of the directive permits cheating by allowing producers to sell different products on different EU markets under the same label. The Directive will not be reviewed until 2023, two years after its entry into force. This is too late, according to Polish MEP Thun und Hohenstein, and she is therefore considering reopening discussions on this topic with other IMCO members in the coming months.

The European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) has published a study on the pros and cons of enhancing price transparency along the agri-food chain. According to the JRC, the main benefits of enhancing transparency should include raising awareness of the market functioning, strengthening opportunities for risk management (improving the decision-making process) and reducing the feeling of uncertainty about market developments. The main risks identified by the JRC were the risks associated with data confidentiality, data security, increased competitive pressure and a possible drop in sales prices. The study was published in the context of the upcoming vote of the Committee on the Common Market Organization on the issue of enhancing transparency in the agri-food chain, which should take place in September 2019. The JRC study ran from 23/10/2018 to 05/02/2019 with LV, SK and BE being involved the most (13%, 12% and 10% of all responses), and HR, CZ, CY, IE, LT and NL involved the least (only one response per country).
The study is available here.

Last week, the Dutch company Rabobank published a report on the current situation in the pork market. According to the Rabobank report, the spread of African swine fever (ASF) in combination with high temperatures, particularly in Eastern Europe, makes it impossible to boost pork production. In spite of the fact that pork production has fallen in the last quarter, pork prices and exports have increased, largely due to the significant spread of African swine fever infection in China. However, the infection continues to spread in Europe, Slovakia confirmed the first occurrence of the disease at the end of July, near the border with Hungary. In order to prevent further spread of the disease, according to the Slovak authorities, all pigs could be eliminated within 3 kilometres of the site of the outbreak. Slovakia thus became the tenth European country affected by ASF. The disease is also spreading in Bulgaria, which will have to eliminate around 17,000 pigs on farms. In Romania, 299 cases of African swine fever infection were reported in July.
The Rabobank report is available here.

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has published an evaluation of the pesticide chlorpyrifos, a substance used for growing, for example, broccoli or oranges. According to the EFSA assessment, chlorpyrifos can be a genotoxic substance and thus interfere with the proper development of children. Because of the genotoxicity of the substance, it is not possible to set safe limits for the use of the substance, therefore EFSA does not recommend extending the license for the use of ethylchlorpyrifos, whose current license expires in January 2020. Corteva, a chlorpyrifos-producing company, disagrees with EFSA's findings. According to Corteva, the results of the EFSA evaluation are inconsistent with the results of studies conducted in the US and Australia showing that chlorpyrifos is a harmless substance.
More information is available here.

The Greens have expressed concern about the activities of the European Commission, which, in their view, did not remove legislative obstacles to the introduction of stricter rules on the use of pesticides harmful to bees. These rules were already drafted by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) in 2013, but have not yet been implemented. MEP Bas Eickhout, Vice-Chair of the EP's Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety, sent a letter to Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Vytenis Andriukaitis asking the European Commission to indicate what steps are planned to be taken to remove these barriers. In 2013, EFSA presented the criteria for assessing pesticide safety in the so-called Bee Guidance document. Member States' representatives at expert level have since been trying to agree on how strict these criteria should actually be. The European Commission has not yet voted on the document; probably for fear that the document might be rejected by Member States. New guidelines would tighten current EU legislation, as the EU and national authorities would have to take into account the long-term effects of pesticides on pollinator populations. Eickhout asks the Commission to have the issue discussed directly by the EU Council, thus avoiding the approval of criteria at expert level. EFSA is now re-evaluating the Bee Guidance document, the result should be known by March 2021.
More information is available here and here.