Volume 5: Animal Health, 1989-96
2. The ruminant feed ban, 1989-96
The legislation
The Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy Order 1988
Extensions to the ban

The Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy Order 1988

2.3 The Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy Order 1988 (the Order) came into force on 21 June 1988. ¹ However, article 7, which established the RFB, came into force on 18 July 1988. This delay was intended to provide a period of grace during which producers, merchants and farmers could use up their existing stocks of ruminant feed before the ban came into force (see vol. 3: The Early Years, 1986-88). Article 7 provided:

(1) No person shall knowingly sell or supply for feeding to animals any feedingstuff in which he knows or has reason to suspect any animal protein has been incorporated.

(2) No person shall feed to an animal any feedingstuff in which he knows or has reason to suspect that any animal protein has been incorporated.

(3) This article shall cease to have effect on 1st January 1989.

2.4 The definition of 'animal' for the purpose of the Order was restricted to ruminating animals. 'Animal protein' was defined as any protein material derived from a 'carcase'. For the purposes of 'animal protein', 'carcase' meant the carcass, or part of the carcass, of an 'animal'. Thus, by a circular method, the Order prohibited the feeding of ruminant protein to ruminants up to 1 January 1989. It was still permitted to incorporate ruminant protein in rations intended for pigs and poultry.

Extensions to the ban

2.5 When the Order was introduced, it was on the basis that the ruminant feed ban would be a temporary measure until studies into the BSE agent's deactivation had established which rendering processes were capable of producing meat and bone meal (MBM) free of contamination. A study to determine the effectiveness of various rendering processes on the inactivation of the BSE agent was established in November 1990. The first results from these studies became available in early 1994 and are discussed at paragraph 2.256. In the event, in December 1988 the Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (No. 2) Order 1988 extended the ban for a further year. ² Following a Southwood Working Party recommendation, the ban was extended indefinitely by the Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (No. 2) Order 1989. ³ See also vol. 3: The Early Years, 1986-88.