© Getty Images
French producers of foie gras produced 21 percent more last year than a year earlier. There is a forced feeding ban in Flanders, so French foie gras is also on our shelves. Because the demand for the delicacy remains high.
After France, Belgium eats the most foie gras. But in Flanders it is no longer allowed to be made because there is a ban on force-feeding geese or ducks. The specialty shop of poultry breeder Filip Callemeyn from Ichtegem was the last foie gras producer in Flanders. Today they still sell it – although not homemade, but imported from France. “We process it, we sell it, but we are no longer allowed to make it. So I now sell foie gras from France,” he says in an interview with Vilt, the Flemish information center for agriculture and horticulture.
And he’s not the only one. Since there is no such ban in France, we buy it en masse there and it is on the shelves here. In specialty stores, but also in department stores. Because even though it is a delicacy, foie gras is not nearly as expensive as caviar, for example.
It is remarkable that foie gras is no longer produced in Flanders, but can still be consumed. Animal welfare organization GAIA wants to put an end to this dispersion and hopes to also enforce a trade ban on foie gras. (Read more below the photo)
To make the liver of geese or ducks grow quickly, feed is literally injected into it. — © AFP
“You find it strange that we are no longer allowed to produce foie gras, but we are still able to import it? Unfortunately, that is how it works,” says spokesperson Ann De Greef. “You cannot impose a trade ban before you have a production ban. That is why it has to be done step by step, even though in an ideal world it could have been done in one go.”
GAIA wants trade ban
Yet GAIA does not intend to wait until foie gras consumption dies out. “We have a lot of confidence in the consumer, but not so much now,” says De Greef. “If we have to wait until the last consumer no longer buys foie gras, we will have to wait a long time. That is precisely why we believe a trade ban by law is so important. Raising awareness alone will not get you there, we have already noticed that after 30 years at GAIA.”
“If we have to wait until the last consumer no longer buys foie gras, we will have to wait a long time. That is precisely why we believe a trade ban by law is so important”
Ann Greef
Spokesperson GAIA
The supply has certainly not decreased in recent years. In France, where our foie gras mainly comes from, production has even increased by 21 percent. In 2023, 20 million ducks were used for foie gras production, compared to 16 million in 2022. However, in 2020 there were still almost 30 million.