France announces new plans to support beef producers

Introduction: Jean Glavany, France's agriculture minister, announced a series of new measures Tuesday, allocating 150 million euros to help French beef producers recover from the crisis of mad cow disease The minister said the measures are aimed at cattle breeders, who are most in need of help From now on to April, the government will provide direct funding of up to 2000 euros ($1786) for each of them In addition, the government may provide further assistance according to their specific conditions Public fear of mad cow disease keeps consumers away from beef, the third effort by the French government in less than a year to help farmers regain their financial status The minister said beef consumption in France was slowly returning to normal, but it was 5% lower than in 1999 Because of the mad cow disease crisis, French breeders, like farmers in other European countries, are watching their incomes fall, complaining that the aid measures announced last year were inadequate A spokesman for France's largest agricultural union, fnsea, declined to comment immediately on the new measures Preliminary data released by the French National Statistical Office in December showed that the average income of French cattle breeders fell by 9% in 2001, while the income of French farmers increased slightly More than 100 people in the UK, France and Ireland have died or are believed to die from a new variant of Creutzfeldt Jakob disease, which is believed to be caused by eating contaminated meat products French food safety agency afssa said Monday that it plans to announce on September 9 whether France should continue to slaughter all cattle raised in places where BSE has been found.