Paul McCartney has joined forces with U.K. MPs who are urging Brussels to scrap any plans to ban the use of meat-related names such as “burger” and “sausage” for plant-based products. The proposed EU ban, if passed into law, would prohibit food producers from using designations such as “veggie burger” or “vegan sausage” for plant-based and lab-grown dishes. “To stipulate that burgers and sausages are ‘plant-based,’ ‘vegetarian’ or ‘vegan’ should be enough for sensible people to understand what they are eating,” the former Beatles star, who became a vegetarian in 1975, told The Times of London. “This also encourages attitudes essential to our health and that of the planet.” The proposed EU ban “could increase confusion” and “undermine economic growth, sustainability goals, and the EU’s own simplification agenda,” eight British MPs, including Jeremy Corbyn, wrote in a letter to Brussels. The Times reported the contents of the letter Saturday evening. The missive includes the support of the McCartney family, which owns a business selling vegetarian food and recipes. The looming ban stems from an amendment that French center-right MEP Céline Imart introduced into legislation that aims to reform EU farming rules. These proposed reforms include how farmers sign contracts with buyers alongside other technical provisions. The bill is now subject to legislative negotiations with the Council of the EU, which represents EU governments.  The proposed rules will become law if and when MEPs and the Council agree on a final version of the legislation to become EU law. MPs in the U.K. fear that the ban, if it survives, would also impact British supermarkets, as markets and companies across the continent are so closely intertwined. Imart’s burger-busting tweaks were supposed to be a gesture of respect toward the French farmers that she represents — but they have divided MEPs within her own European People’s Party. “A steak is not just a shape,” Imart told POLITICO in an interview last month. “People have eaten meat since the Neolithic. These names carry heritage. They belong to farmers.” Limiting labels for vegetarian producers will also help shoppers understand the difference between a real burger and a plant-based patty, according to Imart, despite years of EU surveys showing consumers largely understand the difference. U.K. MPs also cite research in their letter, stating that European shoppers “overwhelmingly understand and support current naming conventions” such as “veggie burger.”

LONDON — When Britain made its formal exit from the European Union in 2021, the move attracted some unlikely fans — among them, South African citrus growers. With the U.K. out of the bloc, it was free to implement its own rules on imported food, including relaxing stringent EU controls on citrus fruit. Today, thanks to Brexit, citrus fruits such as lemons and oranges can be imported to the U.K. without a plant health certificate and without the need for inspection, making the country an increasingly popular partner for South African exporters. But it seems their joy may be short-lived, as the U.K. prepares to realign with EU animal and plant health rules — known as Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) measures — under the terms of the U.K.-EU ‘reset’ deal. This would effectively mean readopting EU citrus controls, which have become even stricter in the intervening years since Brexit.   Since 2022, EU regulations require South African citrus exporters to subject fruits to cooling treatments to limit the spread of pests and disease, such as false codling moth and citrus black spot, in addition to providing a phytosanitary certificate.  However, these measures have come at a significant cost to exporters, who say the cooling treatment heightens the risk of spoilage — particularly for organic fruit.  The South African government has since initiated two separate dispute settlement procedures at the World Trade Organization against EU regulations, arguing that they are unscientific, discriminatory, and primarily protect Spanish citrus producers.  The EU, meanwhile, maintains that its pest control measures are necessary and scientifically sound, citing recent interceptions of pests in South African consignments.  With the prospect of the U.K. now signing up to EU SPS rules — and potentially inserting itself into a bitter WTO dispute — South African exporters are rattled. CALL FOR CARVE-OUTS A South African official — granted anonymity to speak freely — told POLITICO they had recently informally engaged with officials from the U.K.’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to discuss the impact of a U.K.-EU SPS deal on citrus imports but were told that negotiations had not formally begun.  “Whatever they do with the EU, hopefully it will not affect other trading partners,” the official said. One solution under discussion, the official said, was the possibility of applying labels to South African citrus to ensure it could not be re-exported to the EU. The EU, meanwhile, maintains that its pest control measures are necessary and scientifically sound. | Filippo Monteforte/Getty Images “This is just an idea in terms of easy-to-control consignments destined for the U.K. to be identified which requires additional measures for the EU,” they explained. Asked about the impact of an SPS deal on South African citrus, Boitshoko Ntshabele, CEO of the South African Citrus Growers’ Association, told POLITICO “things are in a very early stage, with nothing set in stone.”  “What is clear, however, is that the EU’s current plant health measures on citrus black spot and false codling moth are unscientific,” he said. “These measures restrict trade unnecessarily.” Ntshabele added: “Unnecessarily restricting the supply of high quality and safe South African citrus would have an impact on citrus consumers in the U.K. The U.K. would have to introduce carve-outs.” EXTRA COSTS Over in the U.K., importers who rely on a steady stream of South African citrus to keep consumers happy are also concerned. Nigel Jenney, chief executive of the Fresh Produce Consortium — which represents importers of fresh produce — said the adoption of EU import controls for non-EU citrus imported to the U.K. would be a “huge additional burden at the border.”  “Ultimately, if it occurs, there are significant additional costs the industry will have to pay which sadly can only be passed on to the consumer,” Jenney added. “It’s the same situation we’ve found ourselves in [currently] with Europe.” Jenney, who is in favor of the SPS deal, is now pushing the U.K. government to negotiate an exemption for non-EU fresh produce entering the U.K. that would allow Britain to impose its own import controls on products like South African citrus. “Otherwise we’ll find that, what we’ve saved on the one hand with trading with Europe, we’ve simply imposed that liability, responsibility and cost onto countries that have had no involvement in these negotiations.” Currently, he said, the U.K. grows roughly a third of its fresh produce supply, with around a third imported from Europe and a third from the rest of the world. “So, in simple volume terms, why would we give preference only to Europe?” he asked. The South African government has since initiated two separate dispute settlement procedures at the World Trade Organization against EU regulations. | Fabrice Conffrini/Getty Images A carve-out for citrus in the SPS deal may be possible. According to the “common understanding” document published at the U.K.-EU summit in May, the SPS deal can include a “short list of exceptions to dynamic alignment,” subject to certain conditions. The U.K. is already seeking exemptions for gene-edited products as well as for British animal welfare standards, with negotiations expected to kick off in earnest later this year. Asked about a potential exemption for citrus, a government spokesperson said: “We are removing barriers to trade so U.K. businesses can sell more products in new markets around the world as part of our Plan for Change.”

MANCHESTER — Shadow Trade Secretary Andrew Griffith has warned against “deeper entanglement” with Europe, claiming it could stop the U.K. from exploiting trade opportunities further afield. In an interview with Anne McElvoy at the POLITICO Pub at the Conservative Party conference on Monday, Griffith warned of “unintended consequences” if the U.K. aligns more closely to Europe as part of the government’s post-Brexit “reset” with the bloc. His comments came after a poll commissioned by POLITICO revealed that nearly two-thirds (63 per cent) of British voters backed government plans to negotiate a sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) agreement with the European Union, which would see the U.K. align with EU animal and plant health standards. Just 22 percent were opposed. “Of course, we’re all in favor when it’s couched in terms of a poll as: ‘wouldn’t it be good to remove this particular friction and have these particular rules?’,” Griffith said, when asked about the poll. “But then, the flip side that is not surfaced in that opening is that it may, in future, prevent you from exploiting other opportunities.” In addition, plans to tie the U.K.’s emissions trading schemes with Europe and impose a carbon border tax in line with the EU’s “may impede that very ability to get concessions from India that might unlock big opportunities for financial and professional services,” he added. “You’ve got to be very careful about understanding what are the unintended consequences.” Asked about the possibility of a U.K. free trade agreement with Mercosur — a South American trade bloc comprised of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay — Griffith said he was “very open to it in principle.” But he said it was at odds with the government’s position on Europe “because they’re going for a much deeper entanglement on things like SPS.” Last week at the Labour Party conference, Trade Minister Chris Bryant described a U.K.-Mercosur deal as a “no-brainer,” adding that he had had “very positive conversations” about it with Argentina and Brazil. The EU is eyeing a possible signature of its own Mercosur deal on Dec. 5. Bryant said there “must be chapters that we would be able to close which would be almost identical to the EU that we can close very quickly.”

LONDON — Britain is sleepwalking through its biggest food safety crisis since the horsemeat scandal of 2013, a group of influential MPs warned as they dismissed a recent personal import ban on EU meat and cheese as “toothless.” The government moved in April to prohibit travelers from EU countries from bringing meat and dairy products into the U.K. following an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease across the continent. However, as reported by POLITICO, the ban has not been fully enforced, with experts warning that U.K. health officials lack the funds to uphold the rules. In a damning report on Monday, the parliament’s Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee warned that “alarming amounts” of meat and dairy products were still being illegally imported for both personal consumption and sale. The committee welcomed the government’s ban on personal imports of meat and dairy from the EU but described it as “toothless,” with prohibited products continuing to enter the U.K. through airports, seaports and the Eurotunnel in freight, parcels, personal baggage and passenger vehicles. “It would not be an exaggeration to say that Britain is sleepwalking through its biggest food safety crisis since the horse meat scandal,” committee chair Alistair Carmichael said. “A still bigger concern is the very real risk of a major animal disease outbreak. The single case of foot-and-mouth disease in Germany this year, most likely caused by illegally imported meat, cost its economy one billion euros.” He urged the government to “get a grip on what has become a crisis” by establishing a national taskforce, boosting food crime intelligence networks, enforcing “real deterrents,” and giving port health and local authorities the resources and powers they need.   During the committee’s nine-month inquiry into animal and plant health, experts painted a gruesome picture of the situation at the border, describing cases of meat arriving in unsanitary conditions, often in the back of vans, stashed in plastic bags, suitcases and cardboard boxes. At the Port of Dover alone, port health officials say they intercepted 70 tons of illegal meat imports from vehicles between January and the end of April, compared with 24 tons during the same period in 2024. During a Public Accounts Committee session on animal disease last week, Emma Miles, director general for food, biosecurity and trade at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, said it was unclear whether the increase in the number of seizures of illegal meat at Dover was due to a rise in crime or to better surveillance. “When you’re catching people it might just mean you are doing better surveillance and enforcement,” she said.