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Estonian dairy, fish exporters to address Russian recommendations by spring 2014

TALLINN, January 9 (Itar-Tass) - Estonian dairy and fish enterprises, banned by Russia’s veterinary inspection service Rosselkhoznadzor from supplying products to Russia from January 9, 2014 due to detected violations of sanitary norms, are currently elaborating a plan to address Russian recommendations, the head of the Estonian Veterinary and Food Board, Ago Prtel, told journalists on Thursday.

“Each company will prepare together with the board’s specialists its own plan for action,” he said.

Rosselkhoznadzor imposed restrictions on the import of dairy and fish products from eleven Estonian enterprises for non-compliance with sanitary requirements existing in the Customs Union and Russia. A series of inspections by Rosselkhoznadzor specialists at the end of October 2013 preceded the decision.

“The safety of food is not in question,” Prtel said. “It is a matter of meeting certain requirements existing in the Customs Union, which differ from the European Union regulations.”

He added that the number of exposed violations varied at different enterprises.

“For some companies it will be enough to take only minor measures, while the others will have to invest heavily,” he said.

The board’s officials expect that Estonian dairy and fish producers will manage to eliminate all the violations in the next several months and will be ready to resume exports to Russia next spring.

On January 9, 2014, Rosselkhoznadzor imposed temporary restrictions on five Estonian dairy enterprises and six fisheries for non-compliance with veterinary and sanitary requirements.

As the Analytical Centre of the Russian Federal Fisheries Agency’s information department said earlier, there should be, however, no shortage of Baltic sprat resulting from the sanctions imposed.

Estonia is one of the main exporters of Baltic sprat to Russia. The republic supplied 21,300 tonnes of fish within ten months in 2013 and 28,000 tonnes - or 56 percent of total Russian sprat imports - in 2012.

At present, 33 Estonian exporters are allowed by the Russian watchdog to supply dairy and seafood products to Russia.