Government banned importing meat subproducts for direct selling

The Government banned importing variety meat for direct selling, especially selling in markets and marketplaces imported sausages and beef, pork and poultry offal. This decision was made on Wednesday, July 26, by the Ministers’ Cabinet in order to protect the consumers and native producers. The deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food Industry, Anatol Spivacenco, underlined, in a press statement, the importance of protecting native producers from the invasion on the market of low quality goods and their selling on unauthorized places. Thus, importing offal meat will be allowed only for industrial processing, he noted, mentioning that meat goods will be sold only in authorized places and those equipped with cash registering machines. The official highlights that another justification for this decision is the fact that, in the light of sanitary norms, the meat can be frozen and defrosted only once. As regards the ceasing of sausages imports, Spivacenco said that „such goods can be produced in Moldova as well”. According to the minister, the problem consists in the fact that these are made in countries having other standards than those of RM, due to which Moldovan authorities cannot establish the quality of the goods. The official notes that further in case when Moldova will be interested in importing sausages from other countries, Moldova will align its standards with those from the origin countries. The Government decision also stipulates banning import of inappropriate packed meat, which are not written on and do not contain information about producer. The bill will come into effect once with its publishing in the “Official Monitor of Moldova” paper. 2,000-3,000 tones of subproducts are imported in RM per year. The authorities plan to produce annually by 2010 about 75,000 tones of poultry. This year meat production will be of 40-45,000 tones. The majority of meat goods are imported from Brazil, USA, Poland and Hungary.