In the White Paper on Food Safety of 12 January 2000 the European Commission has announced a series of initiatives to improve and complete the legislation on food and feed controls.

It would prepare a proposal for a new and integrated approach towards official food and feed control in the European Union. This proposal has now been adopted by the Commission on 5 February 2003. Which has been made public as document COM(2003)52. The proposal establishes a clear EU framework for a control system, in which the respective responsibilities of the Member States and the Commission are systematically set out. It takes into account the general principle that all parts of the food production chain must be subject to official controls. Furthermore, it provides for a common approach with regard to controls on imports of food and feed from third countries.

The current control system will continue to apply until the new system enters into force. At that time, the Directives that are currently in place will be repealed and replaced by the provisions of the new Regulation:

N° 70/373/EEC (sampling and analysis – official control of feedingstuffs), N° 95/53/EEC (official inspections – animal nutrition), N° 89/397/EEC and N° 93/99/EC (official control of foodstuffs).