The issue of double standards on food quality must be sorted out, and this aim will be advanced if European Union member states besides the Visegrad Group (V4) join its initiative to draft rules to ensure food standards are uniform across the bloc, Hungary’s minister of agriculture said.

Sándor Fazekas noted in an interview to public television that ministers of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia would discuss in Warsaw on Thursday the issue of international food companies supplying products of lower quality to central and eastern European countries than they deliver to western Europe. The V4 will call on the European Commission to draft rules sanctioning companies for quality deficiencies, he said.

Government office chief János Lázár said earlier the government was examining the issue of inferior quality products sold by multinationals in Hungary from the point of consumer protection and food safety. He said he was appalled by a report by the national food safety authority comparing 24 sample products sold in Austria and Hungary. The report confirmed allegations that the companies are trying to sell “foodindustry rubbish” in Hungary, Lázár said.

via hungarymatters.hu and MTI