Hungary’s law proposal to ban laboratory meat is against the EU law

The sale of lab-grown meat is currently not allowed in the European Union, yet the Hungarian government submitted a proposal to the parliament on 11 March to ban it in Hungary. The European Commission formally warned Hungary in October that the adoption of the law would breach EU regulation.

“Several European countries are already taking the initiative to allow sales. This is why preventive action must be taken”, replied István Nagy, Minister of Agriculture, to one of my Facebook comments, clearly demonstrating an indifference to the basic rules and functioning of the European Union.

In fact, novel foods are subject to a pre-market authorisation process that is carried out at EU level, and not by Member States. The European Commission has so far not authorised the marketing of any products containing laboratory meat, thus none of  EU countries can sell such products. However, if the EU were to decide to authorise cultivated meat products, it would become legal on the entire common market; individual member states could not ban its sale.

Laboratory meat is often confused with plant-based meat substitutes; laboratory meat, however, is grown from cellular tissues extracted from animals. There are a lot of concerns about the issue, for instance regarding the procedure of extracting foetal stem cells. Moreover, it has not been proven that lab-grown meat would be more sustainable than traditional farming of livestock, as it is often claimed.

The production and sale of laboratory meat is only allowed in Singapore, Israel and certain US states. The UK also approved dog food made of lab-grown chicken meat last year. The first request to authorise a lab meat product in the European Union arrived to the Commission last September; a French startup called Gourmey wants to use a laboratory meat product to prepare a traditional French dish, foie gras.

The risk assessment of the submitted application is still underway. The evaluators have nine months to complete the assessment, which may be extended if additional information is needed, as Atlatszo was informed by the European Food Safety Authority, the authority responsible for the authorisation. Based on the results of the risk assessment, the European Commission will prepare a proposal within seven months, and a committee of Member State authorities will decide whether the product can be authorised for sale.

In the hallway of an infringement procedure

István Nagy, the Minister of Agriculture, published the draft law to ban laboratory meat in Hungary last July, and sent it to the European Commission, as required by the rules.

István Nagy, Ministry of Agriculture at the parliamentary debate of the proposed ban. Source: official Facebook-page of István Nagy.

In its detailed opinion, issued in October, the Commission explained that

„No authorisation has yet been granted for any laboratory-grown meat product, these products are therefore not allowed to be placed on the market within the Union, in line with Article 6 of Regulation (EU) 2015/2283. A ban is therefore unnecessary, as currently the prohibition to market it results from Union law and applies to all the Union territory. ”

A ban is also unjustified, since it could pre-empt the harmonised authorisation procedure for novel foods at EU level, the Commission argued. For all these reasons, the Commission claimed that the notified draft does not comply with the provisions laid down in the relevant regulation on the authorisation procedure for novel foods.

In addition, they pointed out that Hungary is the Member State that is the addressee of a detailed opinion is obliged to report to the Commission on the action that it proposes to take on the detailed opinion.

Should the Hungarian authorities not comply with this obligation or should the propoesed draft be adopted without account being taken of the above-mentioned objections,  the Commission may commence an infringement procedure pursuant to Article 258 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

In addition to the Commission, several member states, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark have also commented on the Hungarian law proposal. All five countries argued that the ban is unnecessary because of the existing EU-wide ban. However, if the European Food Safety Authority were to authorise it, the proposed ban would violate Article 34 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, referring to the free movement of goods.

Still chewing over it

The proposed ban was prepared by  Minister of Agriculture István Nagy, and  submitted to the Parliament on 11 March by Dr. Zsolt Semjén. The proposal and its explanatory memorandum do not present the objections raised by the European Commission’s detailed opinion; the text merely states that the draft “has been notified to the Commission of the European Union.”

The general debate on the proposal took place in the Parliament on 19 March. After that an independent MP, László Lóránt Keresztes submitted an amendment proposal to extend the ban to meat products containing genetically modified ingredients. The bill will be discussed in detail by the Agriculture Committee on 25 March.