The 2013 horse meat scandal was a food fraud crisis that began on 15 January 2013 when it was reported that a wide range of food products advertised in the European Union as containing beef were found to contain undeclared or improperly declared horse meat. The crisis escalated in February 2013 when some Findus products were found to contain up to 100% horsemeat instead of beef. A smaller number of products also contained other undeclared meats, such as pork. The issue was discovered through DNA testing on frozen beefburgers and lasagne sold in several Irish and British supermarkets.
The analysis found that 23 out of 27 beef burger samples also contained pig DNA. Adherents of some religions are forbidden from eating pork or horse meat due to their beliefs.
While the presence of undeclared meat was not a health issue, the scandal revealed a major breakdown in the traceability of the food supply chain and the risk that harmful ingredients could have been included. Sports horses, for example, could have entered the food supply chain, and with them the veterinary drug phenylbutazone, which is banned in food animals. The scandal later spread to 13 other European countries, and European authorities decided to find an EU-wide solution. They initiated meat testing of about 4,000 horse meat samples for the veterinary drug.
Investigations
Ireland
Investigations by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) led Ireland to become the first EU state to report the presence of horse meat in beef and to make the results public. The first positive test for equine DNA was on 10 December 2012. It carried out additional tests on 18 and 21 December. The FSAI then sent samples to the Eurofins laboratory in Germany. Professor Alan Reilly of the FSAI testified to the Oireachtas on 5 February 2013 that the results indicated the presence of equine DNA, but not the amount. The IdentiGen Laboratory and the Eurofins Laboratory were asked to determine the amount of horse meat in the samples. On 21 December 2012, the FSAI requested that the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine in Ireland obtain further samples. These were sent to the IdentiGen laboratory on 4 January 2013.
Results were received back from Eurofins and IdentiGen on 11 January 2013. Professor Reilly reported on 5 February that quantitative results from IdentiGen were received by the FSAI late on the evening of 11 January 2013. Of the ten burger products that tested positive for equine DNA, all but one were at low levels. The quantification of equine DNA in this burger product estimated 29% relative to the beef DNA content. Silvercrest manufactured this product on behalf of Tesco. At this point, there was no explanation for the finding of 29% equine DNA relative to beef DNA in this single sample. On 14 January 2013, the FSAI informed the Department of Health and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine of the final results. On the same day, it also informed the Food Standards Agency in the United Kingdom.
The next day, 15 January 2013, the FSAI advised the five retailers concerned, Tesco, Dunnes Stores, Aldi, Lidl and Iceland, of their findings; all these firms withdrew the offending products. The media and newspapers of 16 January 2013 led with the story, focusing on the one burger which tested positive for 29% equine DNA.
Another significant investigation into the horse meat affair in Ireland, by Ireland's Department of Agriculture, published its findings in March 2013. This report's investigation "concluded that there is no evidence that Silvercrest knowingly purchased horsemeat"
United Kingdom
In the UK, a House of Commons Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs report on the horse meat incident was not critical of UK or Irish producers. It expressed concern that horsemeat contamination resulted from fraud and other criminal activity across the EU. Chair of the Committee, Anne McIntosh MP, said: "The evidence suggests a complex network of companies trading in and mislabelling beef or beef products which is fraudulent and illegal."
The second major UK report on the horse meat incident was conducted by Professor Chris Elliott, the Director of the Institute for Global Food Security at Queen's University Belfast. In his independent report, he argues that food crime was at the heart of the horsemeat incident and makes a range of suggestions for how this could be tackled. "Industry, government and enforcement agencies should, as a precautionary principle, always put the needs of consumers above all other considerations, and this means giving food safety and food crime prevention—i.e. the deterrence of dishonest behaviour—absolute priority over other objectives."
Test results
Of 27 beef burger products tested, 37% were positive for horse DNA, and 85% were positive for pig DNA. Of 31 beef meal products tested, 21 were positive for pig DNA, but all were negative for horse DNA. Nineteen salami products were tested, but were negative for all foreign DNA. Of the 37% of beef products tested positive for horse DNA, Tesco's Everyday Value Beef Burgers tested at 29.1%. All other reported brands had less than 0.3% horse DNA. These products originated from Liffey Meats and Silvercrest Foods in Ireland, and from the Dalepak Hambleton food processing plant in the United Kingdom. Trace amounts of horse DNA were also found in raw ingredients imported from Spain and the Netherlands.
Laboratory DNA investigations were requested by the authorities into possible donkey meat adulteration of minced meat products labelled as 100% beef. British company Primerdesign provided many of the tests to laboratories and companies wishing to test for contamination.
Companies
ABP Food Group
By 16 January 2013, four subsidiaries of ABP Food Group had been accused of supplying adulterated meat. They were Silvercrest in County Monaghan, Dalepak in North Yorkshire, Freshlink in Glasgow, ABP Nenagh in County Tipperary, Ireland, and Dairy Crest, Rossington.
Hamburger meat from Silvercrest Foods, a subsidiary of Larry Goodman's ABP Food Group, in County Monaghan, Ireland, was found to contain 29% horse meat relative to beef. Porcine DNA was also found. Tesco dropped Silvercrest as a supplier of processed meat, but ABP said that it "welcomed their decision to continue sourcing fresh beef from other ABP companies". On 15 February 2013, Tesco said, "We will no longer work with the suppliers who fell below our very high standards."
The first apparent instance of fresh beef being adulterated with horse meat was reported by Asda, which removed its 500-gram own-label beef Bolognese sauce from sale. The sauce was supplied by Greencore, which said in a statement that the meat in the sauce had been supplied by ABP Food Group's Nenagh plant in County Tipperary, Ireland. On 4 March 2013, Greencore announced that "multiple further tests for the presence of equine DNA on the same batch of the same product using both screening and quantitative tests (in line with FSA testing protocols) at two different, independent accredited laboratories have all produced negative results" and "an extensive programme of testing of other finished product and raw material at the Bristol facility has produced negative results for the presence of equine DNA. The investigation of the overall incident, overseen by an independent expert... included an audit of ABP Food Group's plant in Nenagh, Ireland... found no evidence of contamination in the supply chain."
Burger King, which had more than 500 fast food outlets in Ireland and the UK at the time, dropped Silvercrest as a supplier,
using suppliers in Germany and Italy instead, after horse meat was found in their supply chain.
Waitrose removed beef meatballs from sale when it found that they contained pork. The meatballs were manufactured by an ABP factory in Glasgow. Waitrose, part of John Lewis, said it would be creating a new facility to supply its own beef products.
Tesco, the Co-operative Group, Iceland, and Aldi also cancelled their contracts with ABP Food Group due to the adulteration.
Food wholesaler Makro, supplier to the restaurant and pub industry, announced that some of its frozen burgers supplied by Silvercrest tested positive for horse DNA. A spokesman said that Makro no longer sells the product in question.
Spanghero
On 14 February 2013, the French government stated that a French meat-processing company, À la Table de Spanghero, had knowingly sold horse meat labelled as beef, and that its licence was suspended while an inquiry was underway. Spanghero imported meat from Romania and sold it on to another French company, Comigel, which made frozen ready meals at its factory in Luxembourg. French Consumer Affairs Minister Benoît Hamon said the meat had left Romania clearly and correctly labelled as horse and that it was afterwards that it was relabelled as beef by Spanghero. The investigation also said some blame may rest with Comigel, claiming the staff there should have noticed anomalies in the paperwork, and realised from the smell and look of the meat once it was defrosted that it was not beef.
Comigel
On 7 February 2013, Findus announced that in a sample of 18 beef lasagne products that it tested, 11 contained between 60% and 100% horse meat. It was also revealed that some of the products sold had minced meat declared as beef that was 60–100% horse meat. The source of the horse meat was third party supplier Comigel, a French-headquartered frozen ready meal producer, from its subsidiary Tavola factory in Capellen, Luxembourg. According to the FSA, the company had been alerted by a third-party French supplier on 4 February 2013, and it tested its beef lasagne products, finding that over 50% of the products tested contained horse meat. According to reports, both Findus UK and the French supplier withdrew all products related to the third-party supplier. The reason for the adulteration was initially stated as "highly likely" criminal activity.
The president of Comigel, Erick Lehagre, told Agence France-Presse that the adulterated meat supplier was Spanghero, a firm owned by Lur Berri and founded in 1970 by Claude and Laurent Spanghero, two former France international rugby players. He said that Spanghero had told him that the meat was not from France, but came from a producer in Romania. On 11 February 2013, France's Consumer Affairs Minister Benoit Hamon warned it "will not hesitate" to take legal action if there is evidence companies had knowingly duped consumers. Hamon said an initial investigation by French safety authorities had found that a French company, Poujol (Spanghero's holding company), had bought frozen meat from a Cypriot trader. That trader had bought it from Dutch food supplier Draap (the Dutch word for horse, paard, spelled backwards), owned by Jan Fasen, who was previously convicted in 2012 of horsemeat fraud dating back to 2007. Draap, in turn, bought it from two Romanian slaughterhouses. Poujol then supplied a factory in Luxembourg, owned by Comigel, which then supplied Findus and the British supermarkets. The Romanian government has stated that there are no contracts between the Romanian abattoirs and any French, Cypriot, or Dutch meat processors.
On 8 February 2013, Findus announced that it would no longer accept meat from Comigel and stopped further deliveries of the product in question. On the same day, Findus UK published a public apology on its website, also announcing that, following DNA testing, three of its products were found to contain horse tissue. These are the 320, 350, and 500 gram packages of Findus Beef Lasagne; the company offered a refund for products purchased. Findus Sverige AB also announced a recall of its 375 gram packs of ready-made single-portion lasagne (code 63957), and published a contact number for customers who had already purchased the products. On 8 February 2013, supermarket chain Aldi announced that it would withdraw from sale Today's Special Frozen Beef Lasagne and Today's Special Frozen Spaghetti Bolognese, supplied by Comigel, after tests found the meat content to be between 30 and 100% horse.
HJ Schypke
The Swiss-based company Nestlé reported on 18 February 2013 that it had found more than 1% horse DNA in two beef pasta products. It withdrew chilled pasta products, Buitoni Beef Ravioli and Beef Tortellini, in Italy and Spain. Sourced from sub-contractor HJ Schypke, itself a German sub-contractor of Belgian-based Nestlé supplier JBS Toledo, also withdrew frozen Lasagnes à la Bolognaise Gourmandes, a product for catering businesses produced in France.
Frigilunch
On 22 February 2013, Birds Eye revealed that DNA tests showed that horse meat was present in Birds Eye chili con carne sold in Belgium and supplied by Belgium firm Frigilunch. Birds Eye withdrew three ready meals that contained beef from sale in the UK.
Sodexo
All of the frozen beef products produced by Sodexo, "one of the largest private catering businesses in Britain", were withdrawn on 22 February 2013 following the discovery of horse DNA in a sample. The company supplies 2,300 institutions within the UK, including schools, old-age people's homes, prisons, and branches of the armed forces.