§ Mr. GaleTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of controls over the (1) importing of bushmeat hand-carried by visitors to the United Kingdom; [154246]
(2) importing of general meat and meat products hand-carried by visitors to the United Kingdom. [154247]
§ Ms Quin[holding answers 19 March 2001]It is illegal for individuals to import fresh meat from third countries into the United Kingdom unless it is fully cooked in a hermetically sealed container and weighs no more than 1kg.
This applies equally to 'wild game meat' which we take to include bushmeat although there is no working definition of the latter term. Where we have advised of the possibility of illegal imports of meat, the relevant enforcement authorities have been alerted and the appropriate action taken. Where illegal meat has been identified, it has been seized and destroyed. No single assessment of the effectiveness of these procedures, based 521W on centralised data, is available as a number of authorities, at local level, may find themselves in a position to deal with an illegal import.