US and Russia poultry import disputes continue

Russia recently approved the import of 150,000 tonnes of chicken meat from other countries, most likely to be granted to Turkey and Italy, since sanitary standards is still being an issue in US poultry.

The 150,000 tonnes is only a quarter of the US share on the Russian poultry meat market. The talks' failure could be seen as a concession to Russian poultry breeders and an attempt to determine if they will be able to fully replace imports on the domestic market.

Reports state that problems with US chicken imports began on January 1, 2010, when Russia enforced new sanitary standards similar to those of the EU, under which the chlorine solution used in meat processing should contain the same amount of chlorine as tap water: 0.5 milligrammes per litre. This is why Russian producers now use European processing technology for chicken meat, mixing cold air with acetic and lactic acids.

American chicken meat is washed with a 20-50 milligrammes per litre chlorine solution. Russian health officials declared chlorine bath to be unsafe and banned the procedure, demanding that US farmers adopt new technology by January 1, 2010 or lose the Russian market.

As of early 2010, Russian producers satisfied approximately 75% of the market demand, and the country imported the remaining 25%. Of that amount, some 80% was imported from the US, the world's largest poultry producer and exporter. The US quota is 600,000 tonnes this year.