Jun
19
The Ministry of Marine Affairs, Rosa Quintana, touring Intecmar facilities. (Photo: Xunta)
Galicia shows compliance with EU requirements for molluscs
SPAIN
Tuesday, June 19, 2012, 23:10 (GMT + 9)
An assessment carried out by the Food and Veterinary Office (FVO), under the Directorate General for Health and Consumer Protection (Sanco) of the EU, confirms that mollusc production and marketing control systems used by Xunta de Galicia are adequate.
The announcement was made by the head of the Ministry for Rural and Marine Affairs, Rosa Quintana, and the Minister of Health, Rocío Mosquera, based on an audit conducted by the Community entity in October, 2011.
In Quintana’s views the results of the evaluation indicate that Galicia “is developing a sound management system for food safety control in molluscs and successfully meets the requirements of the European Commission (EC).”
In Galicia, the Technological Institute for the Control of Marine Environment (Intecmar) is the entity that is responsible for ensuring compliance with Community rules for microbiological classification of production areas and for biotoxin detection.
For the Galician government, this assessment demonstrates the uniqueness of the depuration techniques developed in this Spanish region.
The main objective of the authorities of Galicia is that “the product reaches the consumer in full compliance with all sanitary conditions and with quality assurance throughout the supply chain,” Quintana highlighted.
Meanwhile, Mosquera stressed that the Health Department has a specific control programme of the establishments that operate with bivalve molluscs independently of other sectors.
The Officer of Health considers that the good results achieved after the audit are the consequence of the coordination among the different departments of the regional government and of the system for monitoring the production areas managed by Intecmar.
Furthermore, he highlighted the implementation of a telematics system that contributes to the issuing of the documents of origin and of those that are necessary in the following transactions for the corresponding authorities to have real-time access to the information on the traceability of all the sets.
Last year, FVO European inspectors participated in meetings with health and food hygiene officials of the Galician and state government and visited natural banks and floating culture nurseries to check the procedures for conducting sampling in shellfish production areas. They also visited purification and dispatch/trade centres of bivalve molluscs.
As part of this audit, the European delegates found that the classification of production areas is correct, that their controls are adequate and that the records and information exchanges are the ones that have been set.
Moreover, they performed the follow-up of the wrapping, packaging, identification marking and labelling processes of live bivalve molluscs from the classified production areas of Galicia.
By Analia Murias
editorial@fis.com
www.fis.com
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