AgriNews RSS

July 2 2008, 17:04

Russia may require the safety certificates for EU fruits and vegetables

"Interfax" informs, Russia has obtained the right to require the safety certificates for the plant products supplied by the countries of European Union. Russian Agricultural Inspection informed, this right is provided by the memorandum of the safety of plant products, which are consumed as food products and exported from EU to Russia, regarding the residual content of the pesticides, nitrates and nitrites. This memorandum was signed on March 26th in Brussels; it has been in effect since July the 1st 2008. The representatives of Russian Agricultural Inspection explained that the safety certificate of the content of the pesticides, nitrates and nitrites will be necessary in case if Russian party detects the continuous supplies of a certain type of the products from the definite countries which do not meet the safety standards. In addition to this certificate, the test protocol regarding the content of the pesticides, nitrates and nitrites should be attached. These certificates will be issued by European labs certified by Russian Agricultural Inspection. The Inspection believes that the certificate let the country improve the guaranteed safety of vegetables, fruits and other plant products supplied from Europe to Russia. The necessity of this memorandum was predetermined by the fact that EU allows such level of the residual content of the pesticides which is set according to the scientific estimation of the risks and in line with the Codex Alimentarius standards. However, the levels, set by Russia, are lower than the respective EU levels in some cases. In general, there are 10 points in the memorandum. In particular they stipulate that General Directorate of European Commission informs Russian Agricultural Inspection about the results of the monitoring of the pesticides, nitrates and nitrites content in the plant products of EU countries; Russian party informs EU countries about the results of the monitoring of the plant products supplied from EU to Russian Federation regarding the content of the mentioned substances in these products. If European party requires, Russia will inform about the test methods and also will provide samples for the cross expertise. Also, both parties will inform each other about the legislative amendments regarding the content of pesticides, nitrates and nitrites in the plant products in the possibly shortest terms since such changes have been adopted. Russian party has also confirmed that if the maximal allowed level of the content of pesticides, nitrates and nitrites is not set for a certain type of products, so the level for the closest product of the same product group is applied. "If this level is not set for the whole product group, we will apply the level provided by Codex Alimentarius; if this parameter does not exist in Codex Alimentarius, we use the level of the pesticides, nitrates and nitrites content which is in use in the country-producer of this product", the representative of Russian Agricultural Inspection explained. The memorandum also says that Russian specialists may visit EU countries in order to learn the system of the control of the residual content of the pesticides, nitrates and nitrites in the plant products in case if the welcoming party is notified about the visit and allows this visit beforehand.