February 24, 2007	Saturday	Safar 6, 1428

KARACHI, Feb 23: The European Commission (EC) is reported to have decided delisting of 10 Pakistani fish exporters from the list of approved processing units, exporters said on Friday.

However, they said the detailed report about the delisting will be received in the next few days. They said foreign buyers had cautioned them on Friday regarding EC’s meeting on February 21 in which the decision about delisting of Pakistani plants from the approved list has been taken.

The EC action is the outcome of the inspection of Fish Harbour and processing plants conducted by an EU mission comprising EC’s Food and Veterinary officials from January 22-26, 2007.

The mission’s objective was to find out whether the Marine Fisheries Department (MFD) of the Pakistan government was competent to exercise control on fish plants to fulfill requirements of the EC regulations.

The visit of the fish landing sites, processing units, auction hall and the fishing vessels was taken to verify hygienic practices. It was also a follow up visit of the previous inspection carried out during January 25 to February 2, 2005.

Sources said the EC inspection team observed that the guarantees made earlier had not been properly implemented as the problem was not restricted to the government only but existed at the processing units. Serious deficiencies have been observed during all the stages of fish processing.

Sources added that the fishing plants de-listed will be allowed to export to the EU countries only after a next mission verifies that the units have removed the deficiencies.

However, the EC will keep the names of 10 de-listed units in the approved list for just 21 days so that shipments in the pipeline could be cleared. In this regard, the EC will send a letter to the member states with a request to examine consignments of the interested parties on Pakistan’s border at exporters’ expense.

It may be noted here that the high officials of the ministry of food, agriculture and livestock (Minfal) and the marine fisheries department (MFD) have shown their ignorance of having received any EC report in this regard.

However, Chairman Pakistan Seafood Industries Association (PSIA) Sardar Mohammad Hanif Khan said, “Buyers have informed the exporters about the outcome of February 21 meeting of the EC relating to the delisting of processing units. This information is also available on the internet.”

He said that the final report on de-listing is expected to arrive next week. The EC will inform the Pakistan Mission in Brussels, which after getting the final EC report will give guidelines to the Minfal regarding future steps that need to be taken following de-listing of local exporters by the EU.

However, Hanif said he was meeting Secretary Minfal Ismail Qurieshi on Saturday in Islamabad to discuss the issue. He said that he had also talked to the high officials of the Marine Fisheries Department, and Karachi Fish Harbour Authority so that steps could be taken to save the Pakistan’s fish exports.

For the last few months there have been very few seafood shipments to the EU countries but the real problem will come when bulk shipments of fish and fisheries products will get underway from March to May, he said adding that the exporters will have to find new markets like China.

Meanwhile, Director General Marine Fisheries Department Commodore (retd) S.Q. Raza told Dawn that the MFD had not received any report from the EC on this issue yet. “It is premature to talk on the issue when we do not have any report in hand about delisting of exporters from the EC approved list,” he added.

A Minfal official, on condition of anonymity, said that the ministry had also not received any official report from the EC regarding delisting of processing plants. However, he said that the Minfal has received reports that the EC mission, which visited Karachi Fish Harbour in January, had pointed out serious deficiencies in the processing plants.

The share of Pakistan’s export of fish and fish products to the EU countries stands at around $50 million out of $196 million total exports made in 2005-06.