France has notified the European Union of a draft decree to prohibit the use of certain denominations used to designate meat for products based on vegetable proteins, such as fillet, sirloin, rib, barbecue, chops or ham.
The new legislation has a similar objective to that pursued by the Italian bill on the production and marketing of synthetic food and feed in Italy. The latter, already approved by the Senate, also prohibits the use of names that refer to meat and its derivatives for products made that exclusively contain vegetable proteins.
The draft French decree establishes the list of terms whose use is prohibited for the designation of food products containing vegetable proteins and the list of authorized terms for the designation of food products of animal origin that may contain vegetable proteins and the maximum percentage of protein vegetable that may be contained in the food products for which these terms are used.
The text provides for sanctions in case of violation of its provisions: fines of up to 1,500 euros for a natural person and up to 7,500 euros for a legal person, as clarified by Revista Cárnica.
The decree includes a list of 21 terms “whose use is prohibited for the designation of food products that contain vegetable proteins.”
