Criminal proceedings against Jean-Claude Bellon.
Date: 1990-12-13
6 It must be pointed out first of all that although it is not for the Court, under Article 177 of the EEC Treaty, to rule on the compatibility with the Treaty of provisions of national law, it does, none the less, have jurisdiction to provide the national court with all the criteria for the interpretation of Community law which may enable that court to decide the issue of compatibility in the case before it .
10 Since the products concerned in the main proceedings are products imported from another Member State where they are lawfully produced and marketed, the application of national rules of the kind in issue in the main proceedings must be regarded as hindering intra-Community trade and thereby constituting in principle a measure having an effect equivalent to a quantitative restriction within the meaning of Article 30 of the EEC Treaty . However, since there has been partial harmonization within the Community in the area concerned, it must be examined whether such a measure may be justified on the ground of the protection of human health, as provided for in Article 36 of the Treaty .
11 It must be borne in mind that, as the Court has consistently held ( see, inter alia, the judgment in Case 174/82 Sandoz BV [1983] ECR 2445 ), in so far as there are uncertainties in the present state of scientific research, it is for the Member States, in the absence of harmonization, to decide what degree of protection of the health and life of humans they intend to assure, having regard, however, for the requirements of the free movement of goods within the Community .
14 It must be borne in mind that in its judgments in Case 174/82 Sandoz, Case 247/84 Motte, Case 304/84 Ministère public v Muller and Case 178/84 Commission v Germany, all cited above, the Court inferred from the principle of proportionality underlying the last sentence of Article 36 of the Treaty that prohibitions on the marketing of products containing additives authorized in the Member State of production but prohibited in the Member State of importation must be restricted to what is actually necessary to secure the protection of public health . The Court also concluded that the use of a specific additive which is authorized in another Member State must be authorized in the case of a product imported from that Member State where, in view, on the one hand, of the findings of international scientific research, and in particular of the work of the Community' s Scientific Committee for Food, the Codex alimentarius Committee of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations ( FAO ) and the World Health Organization, and, on the other hand, of the eating habits prevailing in the importing Member State, the additive in question does not present a risk to public health and meets a real need, especially a technological one .
16 It should be pointed out that it must be open to traders to challenge before the courts an unjustified failure to grant authorization . Without prejudice to the right of the competent national authorities of the importing Member State to ask traders to produce the information in their possession which may be useful for the purpose of assessing the facts, it is for those authorities to demonstrate, as the Court held in Ministère public v Muller and Commission v Germany, cited above, that the prohibition is justified on grounds relating to the protection of the health of its population .
17 The answer to the national court' s question must therefore be that, on a correct interpretation, Articles 30 and 36 of the EEC Treaty do not preclude a Member State from prohibiting the marketing of a foodstuff imported from another Member State where it is lawfully produced and marketed and to which one of the substances listed in Annex I to Council Directive 64/54 of 5 November 1963 has been added . However, in the Member State of importation, the marketing of that foodstuff must be authorized under a procedure which is readily accessible to manufacturers and traders and which can be completed within a reasonable period, where the addition of the substance in question meets a genuine need - in particular a technological need - and represents no danger to public health . It is for the competent national authorities to show in each case, in the light of national eating habits and with due regard to the results of international scientific research, that their rules are necessary in order to give effective protection to the interests referred to in Article 36 of the Treaty .