Russia banned Polish meat imports on November 10, 2005 because of the frequent "flagrant violations of Russian veterinary requirements" and "counterfeit products," according to the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Oversight.
Beef and pork imports were limited, along with beef and pork offal, poultry and ground poultry, and raw meat products.
On November 14, 2005, Russia restricted the import of Polish vegetables and cereals as well due to Polish "mass violations of Russian sanitary norms," according to Sergei Dankvert, the head of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Oversight.
Twelve months later, Poland retaliated by blocking the EU-Russia talks on a new Partnership and Cooperation Agreement. As of now, the sides are negotiating the renewal of Polish meat imports to Russia.
On January 1, 2006, Russia restricted raw meat products imports from Ukraine, which was closely followed by a ban on all Ukrainian animal products on January 20, 2006. The ban applied to meat, processed meat, offal, eggs, fish, milk, cheese, butter, and canned foods, because "Ukrainian veterinary services unfortunately failed to ensure their products' safety, which posed a threat for Russian consumers," said Russian Agriculture Minister Alexei Gordeyev.
Before the ban, Ukrainian diary products accounted for up to 40% of all Russian food imports.
In October 2006, Russia reopened the transit of animal products across Ukraine and allowed the imports of beef, cheese and butter produced by certified Ukrainian companies. However, on February 5, 2007, Russia had to cut the number of its checkpoints for diary products on the border with Ukraine because of continuing violations of veterinarian regulations.
Russia banned chilled Norwegian salmon imports on January 1, 2006, after experts reported that artificially bred salmon contains poisonous substances, including heavy metals.
On January 13, Claudette Bethune, an expert with Norway's National Institute of Nutrition and Seafood Research (NIFES) admitted that the fish exported to Russia could indeed contain increased levels of heavy metals, primarily cadmium. On the other hand, NIFES director Oyvind Lie refuted the allegation saying Dr. Bethune was not competent in the issue.
The ban was eventually lifted in April, but in October the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Oversight circulated a list of Norwegian companies whose fish products are allowed for import with all customs checkpoints.
On March 27, 2006, Russia slapped a ban on the imports of Georgian and Moldovan wines which appeared to contain pest control chemicals and other poisons. On March 25, Gennady Onishchenko, head of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, wrote a letter "On import and marketing of alcoholic drinks in Russia" to be circulated among regional Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare departments and the Federal Customs Service. He wrote that a series of inspections revealed that a large portion of the alcohol products imported into Russia did not comply with this country's sanitary safety rules. Therefore, his agency suspended part of the sanitary certificates it had issued to importers of Georgian and Moldovan products, and ordered to take measures to ban the sale of wines made in those two countries in Russia.
In May 2006, Russia banned the imports of Georgian mineral waters Borzhomi and Nabeglavi. Onishchenko said a series of inspections disclosed that part of the bottles contained mineral water that was not up to the existing quality and safety standards, and some were not labeled appropriately in accordance with consumer information norms.
In late September 2006, the Russian Agriculture Ministry said that the U.S. company Bayer CropSciences started marketing genetically modified rice, which failed safety tests. After the U.S. government confirmed this, Japan, too, banned U.S. rice imports, while the EU demanded that the U.S. urgently provided additional information on the transgenic rice. After that, Russia banned all U.S. rice imports.
On October 20, 2006, Russia imposed a ban on Latvian sprats and other canned fish, because Russian experts found they contained high levels of benzopyrene, a carcinogenic substance. It appears in the process of fish smoking, and is very dangerous if consumed in large quantities.
"The levels of benzopyrene we discovered in the canned fish confiscated from Moscow grocery stores were three to ten times over the safety limits," Onishchenko said.
The ban was lifted in January 2007.
On December 4, 2006, Russia imposed a temporary ban on all foreign-made rice after 70 tons of poor quality rice was found on a ship berthed in the St. Petersburg port. The Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Oversight explained the decision by a series of inspections in 2006, which disclosed 2,000 tons of low quality and unsafe imported rice produced in Pakistan, India, Thailand, Egypt, China, Vietnam, Spain and Uruguay.
For example, the Chinese rice appeared to contain a residual quantity of organo-mercuric compounds, while the rice from Vietnam, the key rice importer in Russia, contained high level of chlorpyrifos, a pesticide.
Starting from December 11, 2006, all foreign-made rice must pass through three specially equipped customs terminals in the ports of Kaliningrad, St. Petersburg and Novorossiisk.
On May 1, 2007, Russia banned rice imports from Thailand, after 1,200 tons of Thai rice infested with killed grain pests was arrested at the Novorossiisk terminal. The lot had been shipped from Bangkok, the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Oversight said.
