The consequences of BSE were devastating to those people who later contracted the disease variant CJD. There was justifiable outrage when it became clear that farmers had turned cattle into cannibals by feeding them cow remains. There will be similar alarm at the proposal by the European Union, seven years after the BSE crisis, to reintroduce animal carcasses into the animal food chain. For one legacy of the BSE, scrapie and foot-and-mouth debacles is that consumers have become much more concerned about the provenance of food, and much more conscious of what they are eating.

The European Economic and Social Committee has urged the European Commission to intensify studies which it claims “clearly show that meat meal . . . can be used in pig and poultry feed without posing any danger to human health”. It is true that there is no record of pigs contracting BSE. Yet they are vulnerable, in theory, to such prion diseases. Some experts believe that meat meal also increases the risks of contracting influenza and salmonella.

It is perfectly natural to feel squeamish about a proposal to feed pigs to chickens and chickens to pigs. Although pigs are notoriously indiscriminate in their tastes, and both chickens and pigs are omnivorous, a diet of recycled carcasses is bound to turn some stomachs. While this proposal would not be condoning cannibalism, there remain concerns that the species barrier would be breached.

The reasoning behind the proposal is primarily economic. Before the BSE crisis, animal carcasses were routinely destroyed on farms and collected by manufacturers of meat meal. Since then, the use of meat meal in animal feed has been banned and farmers have had to incinerate animal carcasses, thus burdening their operations with extra costs. Pig and poultry breeders, who were already operating on tight margins, were hit not only by the new costs of disposal but also by a rise in the price of vegetable protein, which in turn raised the price of feed. There is therefore much pressure from farmers and feed manufacturers to reverse the decision. The argument is also made that the regulations have handed a significant commercial advantage to meat producers outside Europe, who do not have to meet such stringent requirements.

The economic arguments are sound in themselves. But the genuine problems with carcass disposal are not a sufficient argument for distorting the food chain. It seems likely that many consumers would now be prepared to pay more to know that their chicken had not been fed on dead animals. The recent surge in organic purchasing, the interest in cookery programmes and the grow-your-own-food movement are all being led by people who are concerned about nutrition and seek to make informed choices for themselves and their families. Farmers could, perhaps, start to make a virtue of the purity of their feed compared with the lower standards of their competitors.

Behind this debate lies the problem that farmers face in fulfilling expectations of ever cheaper food. The average household now spends more on leisure activities than on food. When it costs more to raise a cabbage than a chicken, it is clear that the chicken is not going to have a life of coddled leisure. But consumers are gradually starting to appreciate this contradiction. The answer is surely better information, and better labelling, not more tampering with the food chain.