On behalf of the Italian farmers’ union ‘Unione Coltivatori Diretti’ – Piedimonte Matese area and of the Italian sharecroppers’ union ‘Unione Italiana Mezzadri – Coltivatori Diretti’ – Matese area, bearing two signatures, on the alleged infringement by the Campania Region, jointly with the Italian Ministry of Health, of EU legislation on animal health testing affecting intra-Community trade in bovine animals and swine 

The petitioner reports the alleged infringement of Regulation (EC) No 1226/2002 by the ‘Extraordinary Plan for the control of infectious diseases in Italian Mediterranean buffalo’, adopted in 2019 by the Campania Region together with the Italian Ministry of Health. Regulation (EC) No 1226/2002 lays down rules governing the methods for identifying the pathogen responsible for bovine tuberculosis, stipulating that the official test is the ‘intradermal tuberculin test’, which is divided into single tests and comparative tests. The petitioner points out that, under EU legislation, these diagnostic tests must be carried out so that a livestock farm can be recognised as being tuberculosis-free and so that it can retain that status. According to the petitioner, the above-mentioned regional plan has introduced a diagnostic test in tuberculosis-free livestock farms called the ‘gamma interferon’ test. This test does not need to be carried out in tuberculosis-free farms under Regulation (EC) No 1226/2002 and has apparently led to the unjustified culling of animals who were positive only to the first of the above-mentioned tests. The petitioner claims that such a measure is also in breach of art. 35 of Regulation (EU) 2017/625 on the right of breeders to demand a counter-expertise. To conclude, the petitioner is seeking the assistance of the European Parliament with a view to establishing and declaring the unlawfulness of the contested measure.