Information regarding mercury in foodstuff
Dear Health and Food Safety,
Under the right of access to documents in the EU Treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I request any document for the period from 1 January 2016 to date, which contains the following information:
- all documents containing information about meetings held between European Commission DG Health and Food Safety representatives and stakeholders on the topic of food contamination by mercury since 1st January 2016, including meeting agendas, meeting minutes, meeting supporting documents, observers and participants’ affiliations or other records of such meetings;
- all documents received by European Commission DG Health and Food Safety representatives from stakeholders containing information on the topic of food contamination by mercury since 1st January 2016;
- all documents held by European Commission DG Health and Food Safety regarding meetings, discussions and other exchanges of the Member States working group on food contaminants regarding food contamination by mercury, including meeting agendas, meeting minutes, meeting supporting documents, observers and participants’ affiliations, and any other supporting documentation regarding meetings and exchanges on this topic since 1st January 2016.
This request supplements request 2023/2198 which was sent on 12/04/2023. We thank you for the documents provided in response to that request. Although some may fall within the scope of this new request, it is not necessary to resubmit them here. This request concerns access to documents that were not identified in the previous request 2023/2198.
Yours faithfully,
Claire Nouvian
7 Rue Martel
75010 PARIS - FRANCE
Dear Sir or Madam,
We hereby acknowledge the receipt of your request for access to documents
sent on 03/06/2025 and registered on 04/06/2025 under the case number
2025/2954.
We will handle your request within 15 working days as of the date of
registration. The time-limit expires on 26/06/2025. We will let you know
if we need to extend this time limit for additional 15 working days.
To find more information on how we process your personal data, please see
[1]the privacy statement.
Yours faithfully,
Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety - Access to Documents
European Commission
References
Visible links
1. https://ec.europa.eu/info/principles-and...
Dear Ms Nouvian,
We are writing concerning your request for access to Commission documents
registered on 4 June 2025 under case number EASE 2025/2954.
We are currently working on your request. However, we have not yet been
able to gather all the elements necessary to carry out a full analysis of
your request. We will not be able to send you the reply within the
prescribed time limit expiring today 26 June 2025.
To handle your request we need to consult different Services.
Therefore, in line with Article 7(3) of [1]Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001,
we need to extend this time limit by 15 additional working days. The new
time limit expires on 17 July 2025.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.
Kind regards,
SANTE ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS
References
Visible links
1. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
Dear Ms Nouvian,
Attached please find a letter for your kind attention.
best regards,
The Contaminants Team
European Commission
Directorate-General for Health
Unit E2, Food processing technologies and novel foods
Hello,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2025/2954.
Kind regards,
Dear Health and Food Safety,
Dear Contaminants Team,
I hereby acknowledge receipt of your fair solution proposal EASE 2025/2954 received on the 7th of July 2025. I understand the workload generated by my request and therefore I consent to reduce its scope in a way that would enable it to be processed within the extended deadline of 15+15 working days.
In order to reduce the number of documents identified, I am withdrawing the agendas and invitations to the Working Group on Industrial and Environmental Contaminants as well as those for the Working Group on Persistant Organic Pollutants in food from the scope of my request. I also withdraw the documents regarding exchanges between representatives of BLOOM Association and the European Commission's DG Health and Food Safety, as we already have access to those documents.
In the context of my updated request, I hereby seek to first access documents from category d) (as defined in your fair solution proposal 2025 2954), published from 2025, that fall within the scope of the new delimitation, and then documents from category b) (as defined in your fair solution proposal 2025 2954), also within the revised scope, up to a total of 25 documents. If this results in fewer than 25 documents, I would be grateful to receive additional documents from category c) (as defined in your fair solution proposal 2025 2954) within the revised scope.
Thank you in advance for your cooperation.
Yours faithfully,
Claire Nouvian
BLOOM Association
7 rue Martel
75010 PARIS
FRANCE
Dear Health and Food Safety,
In your fair proposal EASE 2025/2954 sent on the 7th of July 2025, I was asked to reply within five working days so that my application can be dealt with within the extended deadline of 30 working days, counting from the date of registration of my request (June 3rd 2025). I replied with a proposal four days later, on the 11 of July. Since then, I have not heard from you. Please can you kindly indicate when you will be able to send me a response?
Yours faithfully,
Claire Nouvian
BLOOM Association
7 Rue Martel
75010 PARIS
Dear Sir or Madam,
We hereby acknowledge the receipt of your confirmatory request for case
2025/2954, sent on 26/08/2025 and registered on 26/08/2025.
We will handle your confirmatory request within 15 working days as of the
date of registration. The time-limit expires on 16/09/2025. We will let
you know if we need to extend this time limit for additional 15 working
days.
Yours faithfully,
Secretariat-General - Access to Documents
European Commission
Dear applicant,
We are writing concerning your confirmatory request for access to
Commission documents for case 2025/2954 registered on 26 August 2025.
We are currently working on your confirmatory request. However, we have
not yet been able to gather all the elements necessary to carry out a full
analysis of your request. We will not be able to send you the reply within
the prescribed time limit expiring on 16 September 2025 due to ongoing
internal consultations.
Therefore, in line with Article 8(2) of [1]Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 we
need to extend this time limit by 15 additional working days. The new time
limit expires on 7 October 2025.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.
Kind regards,
Secretariat-General - Access to documents
European Commission
References
Visible links
1. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
Dear Ms Nouvian,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2025/2954.
Please acknowledge the receipt of this message by return email.
Kind regards,
Unit E2
Dear applicant,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2025/2954.
Kind regards,
Secretariat-General - Access to documents
European Commission
Dear Health and Food Safety,
Thank you very much for your reply and for granting access to documents in response to my request.
After reviewing the disclosed material, I would like to respectfully raise a few observations:
1. Some of the documents provided seem to be identical, which may affect the overall count of unique items. Indeed, document 6 and document 7, document 8 and document 9, document 2 and document 14 appear to be the same.
2. Documents listed as 10 and 11 seem to be absent from the set provided. I would be grateful if you could kindly verify whether they were omitted inadvertently.
3. Several items in the disclosure appear to be attachments to emails, yet they have been counted as separate documents. For instance documents 2, 3, and 4 are attachments to document 1; document 17 is an attachment to document 18. While I understand that each file may be registered individually, counting attachments as standalone documents does not necessarily reflect the number of distinct communications or records. This approach also means that the 25-document limit is reached more quickly, potentially leaving out additional relevant material.
In light of the above, I kindly request an updated set of documents that accurately reflects the number of unique communications and includes the missing items.
Thank you very much in advance for your attention to this matter,
Yours faithfully,
Claire Nouvian
7 rue Martel, 75010 Paris (France)
Dear Ms Nouvian,
Thank you for your e-mail of 13 October. This has been well received.
We are currently verifying the documents and will get back to you as soon
as possible.
We apologies for any inconvenience,
Good week-end,
The Food Contaminants Team
European Commission
Directorate-General for Health
Unit E2, Food processing technologies and novel food
Dear Ms Nouvian,
Thank you for your e-mail dated 13 October, as a follow-up to our reply letter dated 30 September in connection to your request to documents with Reference EASE 2025/2954.
We apologise for sending the wrong documents for documents listed as No. 7 and No 8 on our list of documents (list attached again for ease).
Attached please find the correct documents for No 7 and No. 8.
As for documents No. 2 and No.14, these are indeed the same, but they are attachments to different e-mails, and therefore counted as separate documents.
Document 2 is an attachment of document 1, together with document 3 and 4. Document 14, is an attachment of the email of document 13, together with document 15 and 16.
As regards documents No.10 and No. 11, as explained in our letter, no access can be given to these documents. Documents No. 10 and No. 11 were counted as documents as they were considered within the scope of your request and were subject to a third party consultation. The third party objected to their release, which could not have been predicted by DG SANTE. The workload for DG SANTE remains the same, whether the third party allows or refuses disclosure. In view of the deadlines and workload, in such cases no new third party consultations can be launched for additional documents.
Furthermore, please note that attachments to e-mails are considered as individual documents, so they are counted separately for the total document number count.
We hope that this clarifies your queries,
best regards,
The Contaminants Team
Dear Ms Nouvian,
We would like to inform you that the reply to your access to documents
requests, mentioned in the title, has been prepared and is waiting to be
signed at appropriate level.
We hope that the reply reaches you soon and we apologies for any delay.
Thank you for your understanding.
best regards,
European Commission
Directorate-General for Health
Unit E2, Food processing technologies and novel foods
Dear Ms Nouvian,
We would like to inform you that the reply to your access to documents
requests, mentioned in the title, has been prepared and is waiting to be
signed at appropriate level.
We hope that the reply reaches you soon and we apologies for any delay.
Thank you for your understanding.
best regards,
European Commission
Directorate-General for Health
Unit E2, Food processing technologies and novel foods