MOSCOW - Rospotrebnadzor Chief Gennady Onishchenko has said that Ukrainian cheese will return to the Russian market if the Russian side has no more complaints about these products.
"After the respective checks, which we will conduct, Ukrainian products could again return to the Russian market," he told reporters on April 17.
Onishchenko said that such a decision would be taken after the inspection of batches of cheese produced at three enterprises: Prometey, Pyriatyn Cheese Factory and Hadiachsyr.
"Each batch will be checked. If we find no vegetable oil and other by-products of the technological process, then by all means send the supplies," Onishchenko said.
"Simultaneously, we’re continuing to work on the harmonization of our documents – national requirements, Russian and Ukrainian – and we’re working on the harmonization of our research labs," he said.
"[Ukrainian Economic Development and Trade Minister] Peter Oleksiyovych [Poroshenko] should soon provide all of the laboratories that the Ukrainian side thinks could operate in this segment of the consumer market," Onishchenko said
He said that the issue concerned labs that can control the quality of cheese supplied to Russia.
According to Onishchenko, after that "Russian experts will start working in laboratories."
As reported, on February 7, 2012, Russia banned imports of cheese made by some of Ukrainian producers to that country due to a lack of compliance of their products with the Russian technical regulations regarding milk and dairy foods.
"The sale of a total of 32 tonnes of cheese has been suspended on the Russian territory," Onishchenko told Interfax in March. Another 120 tonnes of Ukrainian cheese were seized on the border, according to him.
Onishchenko told Interfax on February 27 that Ukraine had more than halved its cheese exports to Russia following Rospotrebnadzor’s complaints about the quality of these products.
On March 3, Onishchenko informed that Russia had completed examining documents of some Ukrainian companies that supplied cheese products to Russia. Rospotrebnadzor notified Ukraine of its willingness to inspect the compliance of their foods with Russian quality standards on the spot.
