June 8, 2004

Russia Wants Uniform EU Certificate For Meat Imports

Russia will accept meat imports from the European Union under individual national veterinary certificates for now, but will require a uniform E.U. certificate as of Oct. 1, the Interfax news agency quoted Agriculture Minister Alexei Gordeyev as saying Monday.

Gordeyev spoke following a truce in a trade spat that jeopardized annual meat imports worth $1.6 billion. Russia began blocking E.U. beef, pork and poultry imports on June 1, insisting that the 25 E.U. countries use a uniform veterinary certificate.

Russian authorities lifted the restrictions after an agreement reached by Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov and E.U. Commission President Romano Prodi on Thursday. As part of the deal, the two sides set an end-of-September deadline for an agreement to resolve Russia's concerns about the E.U.'s system of issuing veterinary certificates.

Moscow had demanded the Commission itself issue a uniform certificate. Describing the agreement last week, E.U. spokesman Reijo Kemppinen said that was legally impossible, but E.U. officials suggested ways might be found to better harmonize the existing national certificates and give greater guarantees that all E.U. countries are applying the same standards.

According to Interfax, Gordeyev said national certificates will be honored until Oct. 1, when a uniform certificate will take effect -a statement that suggests the dispute would resurface if the E.U. doesn't come up with a uniform certificate.

Gordeyev said that Russia understands that the E.U. needs a "transition period" to introduce uniform certificates, but that "during the negotiations Russia insisted that this period be a short one," Interfax reported.

The E.U., which expanded last month to include several former Soviet republics and satellites, accounts for 20% of Russia's poultry imports, 78% of its beef imports and half of its pork imports, according to the Russian newspaper Kommersant.