animal welfare, and lay down the principles for ensuring that official controls are objective and efficient. These rules notably deal with: - auditing and inspection tasks of the official veterinarian (i.e.: ante and post mortem inspection, food chain information, animal welfare, laboratory testing); - health marking; - frequency of controls; - professional qualification of official veterinarians and official auxiliaries. Microbiological criteria Within the implementing rules, Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005 on microbiological criteria should be flagged out. This regulation sets harmonized microbiological criteria, process hygiene criteria as well as food safety criteria. Process hygiene criteria indicate the acceptable functioning of the production process. When analyses show results that are not in line with process hygiene criteria, corrective actions must be defined by the operator in the HACCP programme, so as to improve production hygiene. Food safety criteria define the acceptability of the products/batch placed on the market. When analyses show results that are not in line with food safety criteria, the products concerned must be withdrawn from the market or recalled, and corrective actions must be taken based on the HACCP programme. Principle of mutual recognition The main principle of the single market concept is the “principle of mutual recognition” to ensure that all food products, whether produced in the EU or imported from a third country, can move freely throughout the EU if they comply with the requirements. There is one exception to this principle: certain directives allow Member States to make exceptions e.g. in cases where a country can prove public safety, health or environmental concerns about a product intended for import. Animal health rules As regards to animal health rules, Council Directive 2002/99/EC10 laying down the animal health rules governing the production, processing, distribution and introduction of products of animal origin for human consumption has been applicable since 1 January2005, while Council Directive 2004/68/EC11 laying down animal health rules for the importation into and transit through the Community of certain live ungulate animals has been applied since 20 November 2005. 10
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Council Directive 2002/99/EC of 16th December 2002 laying down the animal health rules governing the production, processing, distribution and introduction of products of animal origin for human consumption. Official Journal of the European Communities, Series L, issue 18, 23.1.2003, pages 11-20. Corrigendum to Council Directive 2004/68/EC of 26 April 2004 laying down animal health rules for the importation into and transit through the Community of certain live ungulate animals, amending Directives 90/426/EEC and 92/65/EEC and repealing Directive 72/462/EEC Official Journal of the European Communities, Series L, issue139, 30.4.2004, p. 128–143
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