Microbiological requirements for food and drink products and requirements for raw milk and raw creamintended for direct human consumption

Amendment of the Commodities Act Decree on the preparation and treatment of foodstuffs and the Commodities Act Decree on hygiene of foodstuffs in connection with the modification of microbiologicalrequirements for food and drink products and requirements for raw milk and raw cream

Articles I and II of the draft Decree may contain technical requirements. The Commodities Act Decree on thepreparation and treatment of foodstuffs is amended in order to add a microbiological criterion for Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (hereinafter: STEC). The presence of STEC in food can have serious public healthconsequences. Due to the lack of specific European or national regulations, the NVWA (Netherlands Food andConsumer Product Safety Authority) has established intervention policy with regard to the presence of STEC infood. With this amendment, the requirement that STEC is not demonstrable in 25 g or ml based on the NVWAintervention policy is included in the Commodities Act Decree on the preparation and treatment of foodstuffs.

The Commodities Act Decree on the hygiene of foodstuffs is amended to take amended requirements for rawmilk and raw cream intended for direct human consumption into account. The reason for this is the opinion ofthe Office for Risk Assessment & Research (hereafter: BuRO) of the NVWA to enhance the safety of rawdrinking milk and raw cream. In addition, rules for raw milk are also declared applicable to raw cream and tomilk from animal species other than cows.
For the sake of completeness, it is noted that Article 13d of the Commodities Act contains a mutual recognitionclause. The mutual recognition principle entails that an EU Member State shall not ban in its own territory thesale of goods that have been legally brought onto the market in another EU Member State on the grounds thatthe goods do not meet its own national regulations. It is important here that goods from another EU MemberState offer at least an equivalent level of protection. The marketing of goods with an equivalent level ofprotection originating from other EU Member States falling within the scope of this regulation is therefore notprohibited on the basis of requirements laid down in this regulation.