An egg trader from Mijnsheerenland in Zuid-Holland has been fined €30,000 for fraud after passing off contaminated eggs as fit for human consumption and battery eggs as free range.

The eggs were stamped with fake registration numbers, making it impossible to track their origins and allowing the trader to ‘damage confidence in the sector,’ the public prosecution department said in court on Wednesday.

Inspectors from the food safety board NVWA found 280,000 unstamped eggs at the trader’s warehouse in June 2018 as well as ‘free range’ eggs from a farm which said it had never done business with the trader.

Some of the eggs were found to contain high levels of the pesticide fipronil. ‘The public prosecution department is particularly concerned that the suspect had not made it possible to check the production plant where the contaminated eggs had come from,’ the spokesman said in court. ‘The suspect has made it possible for these eggs to enter the food chain.’

In 2017, millions of Dutch eggs were destroyed after they were found to be contaminated with the pesticide fipronil.

The court took the unusual step of giving its verdict immediately, ordering the trader to serve 100 hours community service and to pay a fine of €30,000.