The Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry has worked out 45 of the 61 technical regulations stipulated in the national technical regulations program for three years. The implementation of the program comes to an end. These regulations lay down the minimum quality requirements for the production, keeping, packing and sale of agrifood products, Mihai Butucel, the head of the Legislation Adjustment and Legal Division, said in an interview, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. He said that the other 16 regulations are now being formulated. “The technical regulations are needed to institute the minimum requirements that guarantee the security of the product. All the producers are obliged to observe the regulations,” Butucel said. According to Butucel, different categories of producers are associations participate in the formulation of the technical regulations. This is a long-term process that requires the involvement of different participants in the agrifood market. “The technical regulations have been already approved by the Government and will come into force in half a year or even a year in certain cases so that the producers manage to reequip the companies and production lines,” Butucel said. “The regulations will stimulate the exports of agrifood products to the EU and will enable to avoid possible problems.” Vitalie Caraus, the head of the Agriculture Ministry’s Veterinary Legislation Adjustment Division, said that most of the technical regulations and sanitary norms for the products of animal origin recommended by the European Commission missions have been worked out and approved by the Government. The given missions visited Moldova during the last two years to see if it is ready to obtain the status of third country that exports products of animal origin to the EU. At its last meeting, the Government approved the sanitary and veterinary norm regarding the hygiene and content of unwanted substances in fodder. The national procedures for determining the quality and compliance of the animal products are being adjusted to those used in the EU. Quality compliance laboratories are being built and reequipped in Cahul and Drochia as part of the World Bank Competitiveness Enhancement Project. A similar lab works in Chisinau. “We hope that the producing companies will finish the re-equipment process in several months so that the animal products are produced, packed and kept in accordance with the European standards,” Caraus said.