The term ‘veggie-burger’ may soon go out of commission after EU lawmakers on Wednesday voted to keep meat terms like ‘burgers’ and ‘sausages’, ‘steak’, and ‘escalope’ away from plant-based or vegetarian items, as part of an amendment to protect farmers.
To strengthen farmer’s negotiating ground, the EU parliament lawmakers voted by 355 to 247 in favour of the amendment that will protect them against powerful companies in the food supply chain which may impose unfavourable conditions on them, news agency Reuters reported.
The EU governments and Commission will negotiate to draft the text of the final regulation with the Parliament backing a ban of terms such as “veggie-burger” or “vegan sausage” and specifying a meat-only list which includes “hamburger”, “egg yolk” and “egg white”.
Pertaining to EU’s already determined definition of dairy items only milk, butter, cream, yoghurt and cheese qualify. Others, such as oat milk do not make the cut since they are not “products secreted by mammary glands”, instead ‘oat milk’ is referred to as ‘oat drink’.
Earlier in 2020, EU lawmakers voted against a proposal to ban the use of meat-related terms for plant-based alternatives.
