When is a Cornish pasty not a Cornish pasty?

By Jon Massey on August 12, 2009 2:20 PM |

Tagged with:

By Jim Fitzpatrick

Jim Fitzpatrick142WEB.jpg

At Defra I've been focusing on questions such as "when is a Cornish pasty not a Cornish pasty?"; when is it OK to eat it? And when is it time to discard it? Foods with Protected Name status are given legal protection against imitation throughout the EU, and I've been reminding farmers, producers and consumers that the scheme guarantees the authenticity of regional and traditional foods.

At a recent Downing Street event to showcase foods with protected status, my message to producers and consumers alike was, let's put our excellent regional fare on the map: Cornish Clotted Cream, Melton Mowbray pork pies and Whitstable Oysters are already registered, but why shouldn't the Bakewell Pudding or Yorkshire Beer be formally recognised?

- We're calling for a radical rethink of how the UK produces and consumes its food.

While our food supply is fairly secure, climate change and population growth could damage this and producers, supermarkets and consumers are invited to suggest how a secure food system should look in the future.

The assessment we've undertaken shows the UK is doing well in many areas which make up a secure and sustainable food system, and, with more people expressing a desire to buy more UK produce, I'm hopeful that we can have our cake and eat it - but only a modest slice, mind you.

- Jim Fitzpatrick is MP for Poplar and Canning Town