Russia restricted vegetable and fruit import from Belarus

Restrictions come into force on October 20.

Charter97.org learnt it from Russia's agricultural watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor.

“As previously reported, the cases of importing unmarked quarantineable products from Belarus to Russia have become more frequent. There have been 82 reports about the deliveries of unmarked products for the last two months. It violates clause 45 of the rules on plant quarantine and the import of quarantineable products to Russia, their storage, transportation, processing and usage set by Russian Ministry of Agriculture's order No. 456 of 29.12.2010.

The import of quarantineable products of unidentified origin to Russia makes it impossible to evaluate the risks, threats and possible damage from such products. In this connection, Rosselkhoznadzor takes measures to prevent the destabilisation of the phytosanitary situation in Russia and sent an appeal to the Main State Inspection of Seed Farming, Quarantine and Plant Protection at the Belarusian Ministry of Agriculture and Food to inform that lots of unmarked quarantineable products cannot be brought into Russia from October 20,” the Russian agency says.

Rosselkhoznadzor also reminds Belarus that products of high phytosanitary risks transported from Belarus to Kazakhstan via Russia can be brought into Russia only through checkpoints Krasny Kamen, Krasnaya Gorka and Lobok and the field “additional declaration” in phytosanitary documents for the products must be filled.