France demands more information over Europe egg scandal

French Agriculture Minister Stephane Travert said today he wanted "much more fruitful and rapid exchanges of information" with his EU partners over a tainted egg scandal.
Eggs contaminated with an insecticide called fipronil have been discovered in Germany, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, Britain and France, with millions of them pulled off shelves by supermarkets.
The French agriculture ministry said it had also ordered a national enquiry into the egg industry to check for the presence of fipronil, which is used in veterinary products to get rid of fleas, lice and ticks.
Belgium's agriculture minister Denis Ducarme accused Dutch authorities of failing to inform their counterparts in the EU about the discovery of fipronil in some eggs last November.

"When a country like the Netherlands, one of the world's biggest exporters of eggs, does not pass on this kind of information, that is a real problem," he told a parliament hearing.
The Dutch food and goods watchdog NVWA rejected the claim.