Results of Two-Day Meeting of Joint Russian Norwegian Working Group for Safety Assurance of Exported and Imported Fish and Fish Products

The Russian delegation was headed by Assistant of the Head of the Rosselkhoznadzor Alexey Alekseenko; the Norwegian delegation was headed by Director of Central Office of Norwegian National Food Safety Authority (Mattilsynet) Bjorn Rothe Knutdtsen.

Based on the results of the meeting the protocol describing the agreements achieved in the most important spheres of cooperation between the Rosselkhoznadzor and Mattilsynet was signed.

In particular, measures to ensure the compliance of the Norwegian fish products destined for export into the territory of Russia with sanitary requirements and standards of the Customs Union and Russia were discussed. In this respect the Norwegian party informed the Rosselkhoznadzor that national fish industry associations in cooperation with Mattilsynet developed a system of measures aimed at assurance of compliance of the Norwegian fish products with sanitary requirements and norms of the Customs Union and Russia. For this purpose the Norwegian fish industry associations developed, agreed with Mattilsynet and distributed among the plants a document describing the requirements of the Russian legislation to microbiological criteria for products produced by the Norwegian plants and destined for export to Russia. Mattilsynet will inspect fish products destined for export to Russia. The first inspection launched in March 2014 will be devoted to physical control of products. Besides, Mattilsynet will investigate all cases of dangerous from the veterinary point of view fish products detected by the Rosselkhoznadzor in the course of laboratory monitoring and at the border. The Rosselkhoznadzor welcomed Mattilsynet’s initiatives and requested to provide it with the developed document. The Rosselkhoznadzor also applied to Mattilsynet with a request to provide it with the description and results of current physical control of the Norwegian fish products as well as with the information about future inspections. The Rosselkhoznadzor without any prejudice to the activities of industry associations attracted the attention of the Norwegian party to the fact that Mattilsynet is responsible for the compliance of Norwegian fish products with sanitary requirements of the Customs Union and Russia. At the same time the Rosselkhoznadzor asked the Norwegian party to inform the Russian side about the cases of dangerous from the veterinary point of view Russian fish products delivered to Norway including for temporary storage in order the Rosselkhoznadzor could take measures to prevent such cases in future. The parties agreed that their specialists in the sphere of laboratory control would exchange visits to share the experience about the techniques used to test harmful and banned substances. When the issue about the inspection of the Norwegian fish processing plants by the Customs Union specialists was discussed the Norwegian party informed the Russian side that it was interested in joint inspection of the Norwegian fish processing plants interested in export of their products to Russia. The Russian party informed the Norwegian delegation that the possibility of such inspection would be considered in accordance with the applications which had already been submitted by the third countries as well as human and financial resources of the Rosselkhoznadzor. The parties agreed that the list of establishments to be inspected would be agreed at least 14 days before the inspection starts. If necessary the parties may agree the inclusion of additional business operators into the inspection plan at a later time. The parties discussed the key issues of safety assurance of salmon smolt deliveries from Norway to Russia including agreement of certificate for the abovementioned products and agreed that it is important to facilitate further development of aquaculture in Russia and Norway. The draft model of a new veterinary certificate for breeding material exported from Norway to Russia including smolt proposed by the Norwegian party was sent to the appropriate scientific centres subordinate to the Rosselkhoznadzor for risk assessment. The Russian party took into consideration the information provided by the Norwegian party about the presence of infectious pancreatic necrosis virus in the Norwegian territory and would use this information during the control of individual consignments of smolt and other breeding material of salmons exported to Russia from Norway. The validity period of the previously agreed certificate for smolt will be prolonged for a year. Speaking about the development of a joint electronic certification system between the Rosselkhoznadzor and Mattilsynet enabling to trace products “from farm/vessel to fork” at an early stage used to confirm the validity of the certificate the parties agreed to hold meetings between the technical specialists on this issue.