Illegal meat imports: UK farmers face rising risk

Unsurprisingly much was made of this and that through diligent policing those involved were traced, arrested and are now spending their days at His Majesty’s pleasure.

A great result and shows that the border is being defended against the organised criminal that try to bring illegal loads into the UK. Loads that no doubt would have had a severe economic impact on the country via the cost of local policing, healthcare interventions and the associated costs of county lines.

Imagine if that 5.7t were not cocaine, but was instead smuggled meat? 569 miles south of The Scottish Farmer’s offices is the Port of Dover.

So far this year, Border Force, and not the National Crime Agency, have intercepted not 5.7t of illegally smuggled meat but 110t.

That isn’t just a load of hapless tourists bringing in a few packs of meat because they’d enjoyed it whilst away on holiday. This is, make no mistake, organised crime.

I don’t mince my words here.

Whilst the UK currently has some of the highest deadweight prices for beef, lamb and pork in the world our market creates both an opportunity for smugglers and a temptation for rogue processors to try to either sell cuts or manufacture products such as sausages and pies in the hope of undercutting legitimate businesses in the meat industry.

The pictures that I have seen of some of the meat seized are horrific. Black bin bags sealed with gaffer tape, and which contain skin intact sheep carcasses being transported on the floor of a dirty non refrigerated van.

Sides of pork and plastic bins of assorted pork cuts piled into the back of non-refrigerated vehicles and destined for a dip in bleach before further processing in unlicensed manufacturing units.

However, it isn’t just the possible impact on consumer health that this sort of criminality can have, it is the bigger cost to the UK economy and especially to hard working farmers such as yourselves.

Many will no doubt recall the 2001 foot-and-mouth disease outbreak. The total cost to the economy was estimated at £8bn. Farmers along with other rural businesses were in the eye of the storm and livelihoods were destroyed.

I have seen estimated that were there to be a similar FMD outbreak today, the economic cost would be pushing £18bn. And of course, the biggest threat to ruminants for FMD is illegally smuggled meat.

Were African swine fever to enter the UK then the immediate impact would be no movement of pigs on or off farms for 28 days. This would see around one million pigs back up in the supply chain adding additional cost burden to farmers.

What is worse, is that an outbreak of FMD, ASF or heaven forbid BSE would stop valuable export trade. High value markets such as the Middle East and Asia would immediately suspend trade with the UK and as is evidenced by freely available government figures, take years to re-instate.

It is believed that much of the illegal meat entering the UK via Dover starts out as livestock Eastern Europe and comes from both EU and non-EU member states.

A look at the FMD page on the European Commission website details support that the EU have recently offered to Georgia and Turkey to try to halt spread in those countries noting that ‘the SAT2 strain of the virus has been identified as a potential threat to livestock in the whole European region’.

WOAH’s latest situation report for ASF published September 27, 2024 notes in the section; ‘on-going events for which there were new outbreaks’ that within Europe this covers, ‘Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Moldova, Poland, Romania, and Ukraine’.

AIMS, like most other trade associations are members of the UK Livestock Chain Advisory Group (LCAG). In July we wrote to the Defra secretary of state, Steve Reed, highlighting issues at the Port of Dover in respect of the Border Control Post at Sevington, 22 miles inland, only being able to carry out 100 of so physical checks of commercial vehicles carrying products of animal origin entering the UK from the UK and the rest of the world.

Whilst non-commercial vehicles bringing in illegal meat too often go undetected and pass-through Dover and on into the country. Those vehicles which are stopped and searched will at best see their load confiscated but the driver face no further action and their vehicle not be detained.

In reply to the LCAG letter, Steve Reed said: “Illegal goods are not pre-notified, so no one has access to information on this. This type of import is most commonly smuggled moving in a ‘white van’ as a non-commercial movement. This is not Dover PHA’s responsibility; the responsibility lies with Border Force to identify, detain and seize illegal Products of Animal Origin (POAO).”

Ah Border Force. I was glad that he mentioned them.

According to the National Crime Agency (NCA) Border Force are operational partners.

The NCA’s mission is that it ‘leads the UK’s fight to cut serious and organised crime, protecting the public by targeting and pursuing those criminals who pose the greatest risk to the UK’.

They have offices in London, Bristol, Birmingham and Warrington but not at The Port of Dover nor in Scotland!

And that they focus their operational efforts:

• Upstream: Disrupting those at the top of the criminal chain who are responsible for the harm that organised crime causes to the UK, as well as the people and systems that support their activities and launder their money.

• Overseas: Tackling serious and organised crime at its source and en route to the UK, working alongside international partners to prevent criminal activity from reaching the UK’s streets.

To my mind, they don’t appear to be particularly effective when it comes to the illegal importation of the meat. The impact that this type of crime has on farmers and food processors and the potential economic impact it could have on the whole of the United Kingdom domestically and with overseas trade.

Those found illegally importing meat to the UK must face criminal charges, not only should their rotting cargo be confiscated, but their vehicles as well must be seized and in the event of conviction, be crushed.

The Port of Dover is a long way from your farms and fields but the consequences of illegal meat imports potentially brings the long shadow of organised crimes and it’s implications right to your front doors.