The ban had been imposed on Friday, following renewed concern in Belgium over possible contamination by cancer-causing dioxin.

The Dutch agriculture, nature and fisheries ministry said that new information from the Belgian government showed that the scare involved pigs on farms already linked to the earlier dioxin contamination.

"As these farms are already on a Belgian list of suspected companies, export of pigs and pig meat from these companies is forbidden. We therefore do not think it is necessary to maintain the ban on Belgian pig meat," the statement said.

The Dutch ban had been imposed because of what the ministry called the difficulty of obtaining information from the Belgian Government.

Some 200 Belgian pig farms have been closed and some 80,000 tonnes of pork meat seized.

New measures

The Belgian government was forced to introduce new emergency measures after discovering that farms which at first were given a clean bill of health had in fact been using potentially contaminated feed.

New Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt has made tackling the food crisis his top priority

The high levels of dioxin in the feed have been linked to cancer.

Those farmers affected will also be offered interest-free loans to cope with the crisis.

They have already suffered losses worth $1.5bn and some farmers have warned they may go out of business.

Embargo vindicated

The effects of the food scare have been felt much further afield than Belgium and many countries are still enforcing a ban on all Belgian farm produce.