Contaminants in Food (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations.)

These Regulations make provision for the enforcement and execution of Commission Regulation (EC) No. 1525/98 (O.J. No. L201, 17.7.98, p. 43) and Commission Regulation (EC) No. 864/1999 (O.J. No. L108, 27.4.99, p. 16) both of which amend Commission Regulation (EC) No. 194/97 (O.J. No. L31, 1.2.97, p. 48) setting maximum levels for certain contaminants in foodstuffs (together “the Commission Regulation”). They also implement Commission Directive 98/53/EC (O.J. No. L201, 17.7.98, p. 93) laying down the sampling methods and the methods of analysis for the official control of the levels for certain contaminants in foodstuffs.

These Regulations, which amend the Contaminants in Food Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1997—

(a) provide that it is an offence to place on the market food which fails to meet the requirements of Article 2.1 of Commission Regulation 194/97 or to contravene Article 2.4 thereof (regulation 4);

(b) apply Article 8 of the Food Safety (Northern Ireland) Order 1991 with modifications so as to require, by service of a notice, that food (other than “authorised lettuce or spinach”) which may contravene the requirements of Article 2.1 of Regulation 194/97 is to be removed for the purposes of inspection to a place having the proper facilities to do so and provide that it is an offence to knowingly contravene such a notice (regulations 4 and 7);

(c) modify the application of Article 29 of the Food Safety (Northern Ireland) Order 1991 so as to provide that the taking of any samples of specified food must be in accordance with the methods described in Commission Directive 98/53 and require that samples of specified food are prepared and analysed in accordance with that Directive (regulation 5);

(d) require records containing specified information to be kept and produced upon request (regulation 6);

(e) amend the Food Safety (Sampling and Qualifications) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1991 (regulation 8);

(f) revoke the Aflatoxins in Nuts, Nut Products, Dried Figs and Dried Fig Products Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1993 and make a consequential revocation of a provision of the Food Labelling Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1996 (regulation 9).