European food researchers from 27 member EU states are set to meet in Brussels, Belgium, to establish plans to address the horsemeat mislabeling scandal.
The EU Standing Committee on the Food Chain will outline plans to implement large-scale testing of beef products in order to identify if they contain horse DNA, and determine the extent of mislabeling.
The committee will also recommend separate tests to determine the extent of contamination of horse meat with phenylbutazone, a veterinary medicine which is believed to be harmful to humans. These plans are expected increase the confidence over the safety of food in Europe.
However, the plans have to be accepted by the EU ministers if they need to be implemented.
Supermarkets across Britain, France and Sweden recently removed a number of products, including beef lasagne, spaghetti bolognese and burgers, from shelves after tests identified that some of them contained nearly 100% horsemeat. The UK has initiated an investagation to identify the source of the horsemeat.
Earlier this week, the Food Standards Agency (FSA) has suspended operations at two meat processing plants in the UK as part of ongoing investigations into the horsemeat scandal in the country.
