Food Control Laws
Austria has very strict laws regulating its food and drink industry. Every single piece of meat is quality-controlled and registered even when it is hunted game. The same strict rules are in place for milk and cheese. The Ministry for Agriculture and the Gesundheitsamt (Department of Health) regulate industry and farmers to make ensure the high quality level of food products, including assuring the quality of the international "made in Austria" brand.
Austrian consumers are typically suspicious of meat of foreign origin in particular, following the scare over BSE. Organically produced goods are also in high demand, and the Austrian government has introduced additional quality standards with stricter rules, such as BIO or AMA-Gütesiegel. A new standard is "Genfrei" or "Gentechnikfrei" meaning the food is free of Genetically Modified ingredients (GMO).
Following a 1985 scandal in which it was revealed that some Austrian wine had been adulterated (sweetened) with diethylene glycol (a type of antifreeze), the government introduced strict quality controls and now Austrian wine is renowned for its quality.
Read more about this topic: Austrian Cuisine
Famous quotes containing the words food, control and/or laws:
“The office of the prince and that of the writer are defined and assigned as follows: the nobleman gives rank to the written work, the writer provides food for the prince.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)
“Only one thing is certain: if pot is legalized, it won’t be for our benefit but for the authorities’. To have it legalized will also be to lose control of it.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)
“However great a man’s fear of life, suicide remains the courageous act, the clear- headed act of a mathematician. The suicide has judged by the laws of chance—so many odds against one that to live will be more miserable than to die. His sense of mathematics is greater than his sense of survival.”
—Graham Greene (1904–1991)