SEAFOODNEWS.COM by Eugene Gerden — Nov 3, 2014 — MOSCOW — The Russian government plans to abolish mandatory laboratory tests of fish, directly landed at Russian ports, according to a press announcement of the Russian Ministry of Agriculure.
It is reported that this proposal has already received a support of Russia’s Vice Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich and may come into force after November, 17 this year.
The new proposal has already been welcomed by Russian fisherman. According to Alexander Fomin, head of the All-Russian Association of Fish Producers and Exporters, laboratory tests for processed fish products should be abolished or reduced to a minimum. At the same time, according to him, there is a need to continue to use such practice in the case of live and chilled fish. According to the Association, about 90% (3.2 million tonnes) of fish, supplied to the Russian coast comes in processed form.
The need to abolish mandatory laboratory studies for fish, supplied to the Russian market, has already been announced by the All-Russian Association of Fishery Enterprises, Entrepreneurs and Exporters, the Russian Pollock Association, and the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs.
This has also been supported by Rosrybolovstvo. According to Vasily Sokolov, Rosrybolovstvo’s deputy head, these tests should be abolished if risks of contamination of fishery products are minimal.
The same position is shared by the Federal Veterinary And Phytosanitary Monitoring Service (Rosselkhoznadzor). According to Nikolai Vlasov, deputy head of Rosselkhoznadzor, the current scheme may be replaced by another one, when a captains certify the catch by himself in a special Mercury electronic system.
In this case, according to Vlasov, the State Veterinary Service will inspect a batch only one time – either when unloading at the plant for processing, or at the end of the transport chain.
The abolishment of mandatory laboratory tests will be associated with significant savings for fisherman. According to German Zverev, President of the Pollack Association, only in 2012 total costs of fisherman, associated with this amounted to 3.6 billion rubles (US$100 million).
The mandatory testing also greatly increased the number of days it took to get fish from russian vessels into markets, with sometimes a single offload taking many days before the product could be released.
Due to this, many of vessels preferred to supply their products for exports, instead of the domestic market.
This story originally appeared on Seafood.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.