Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council on the overall operation of official controls in the Member States on food safety, animal health and animal welfare, and plant health

The basic principles of EU feed and food law are laid down in Regulation (EC) No 178/2002. Under this Regulation, the primary responsibility for ensuring that food is safe rests with the food/feed businesses right along the food/feed chain, from primary production to the point of final sale to the consumer. Regulation (EC) No 834/2007 contains requirements for organic production and the labelling of organic products. Regulation (EU) No 1151/2012 contains requirements for quality schemes for agricultural products and foodstuffs.

Member States are obliged to monitor and verify that business operators fulfil the requirements of EU law on food and feed safety (including animal health, animal welfare and plant health), on organic production and on quality schemes. They are required to operate systems of official controls for this purpose.

Regulation (EC) No 882/2004 sets out how these controls should be organised and operated. In essence, it lays down general rules for the performance of official controls to verify compliance with EU rules on food and feed. In particular, it requires Member States to verify compliance by operators with specific legal requirements, and that goods on the EU market (either EU produced, or imports) are in compliance with these requirements.

Regulation (EC) No 882/2004 also sets out rules on controls by the Commission services on Member States to verify that they comply with the obligations laid down in food and feed legislation. Member States must establish and implement multi-annual national control plans (MANCP) to give effect to the requirements of the Regulation, and are required to submit to the Commission an annual report on the implementation of these plans.

Article 44 (4) and (6) of Regulation (EC) No 882/2004 requires the Commission to establish, and submit to the European Parliament and Council, an annual report on the overall operation of controls in the Member States in the light of:
(a) the annual reports submitted by the national authorities on their control activities;
(b) Commission controls carried out in the Member States;
(c) any other relevant information.

This is the third such report submitted by the Commission. In particular in relation to the results of the Commission's own controls and other relevant information, the report contains an account of control information as and when it becomes available, thus striving to be as up-to-date as possible on the delivery of official controls in the Union.

EUR-Lex: COM(2013)681: Follow the progress of this report through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2013:681:FIN

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