There has been a disturbing number of incidents involving food in the Netherlands and meat product producers in particular have a lack of ethical awareness, according to the head of the food safety body NVWA in Wednesday’s Financieele Dagblad.

‘It has become normal to go as far as you can and hope you wan’t get caught and that shows a blurring of standards,’ the organisation’s director Harry Paul told the Financieele Dagblad.

‘This has led to a number of serious shortcomings and this delivers serious risks for the near future as well.’

Horse meat

The Dutch meat industry has been hit by a series of food scandals in recent years, including the sale of horse meat as beef and meat contaminated by faeces and banned hormones.

‘Dutch food is still safe but the incidents we have come across indicate a worryingly large scale [of problems],’ Harry said.

Ethical values, such as respect for animals themselves, should be more important, he said, even if that leads to lower production and exports.

‘At the moment we run from incident to incident. Perhaps we should take a step back in the amount of food we are producing.’ Meat is being treated as a commodity, he said. ‘The value and respect for the product has gone. It has become a tough business.’

The Netherlands exports foodstuffs to the value of €60bn per year, the FD says.