KENYA - Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS), the government’s standards agency’s Managing Director Charles Ongwae has been arrested hours after the body confirmed that imported contraband sugar was contaminated with copper. According to an article published by the Daily Nation, the standards boss was arrested alongside quality assurance and inspection director and head of the…
TANZANIA - The government of Tanzania has proposed changes to its Cashewnut Industry Act (Cap, 203), scrapping the 65% of the crop export levy remitted to farmers through the Cashewnut Board of Tanzania (CBT). Amendment to the law will see the export levy collected in the consolidated fund, instead of the current situation where some…
ETHIOPIA - The Food, Medicine Authority of Ethiopia considers decentralizing after the government revealed plans to re-establish the federal authority with a focus on product regulations, leaving services to other agencies, reported the Fortune. With the new bill awaiting approval and endorsement by parliament, the country seeks to restructure the Food, Medicine & Health Care…
USA - The United States has threatened to impose a 25% tariff on products with ‘industrially significant technologies’ from China while the latter has promised retaliatory measures on 100 types US goods including 25% tariff on soybean. The new measures were announced by US President Donald Trump on June 14 prompting a haste response from…
KENYA- Seaboard’s Corporation’s offer of US$0.40 per share for Unga Group will wait longer to close after a section of Unga’s significant shareholders termed the offer by the multinational conglomerate as inadequate, citing the company’s assets. The extension indicates that Seaboard has not yet met minimum requirement for a 75% stake needed for the transaction…
GERMANY – The Agriculture Ministry of Lower Saxony has ordered the recall of 73,000 eggs from six German states as they were due to be sold in the market while found to be contaminated with fipronil. Fipronil is used to treat lice and ticks in chickens and some tests show that it can harm kidneys,…
ISRAEL - Aleph Farms, Israeli food technology start-up company, has called on the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to promote clean meat for its compelling safety advantages, such as being antibiotic free and pathogen free. Alepha Farms made the request in response to the US Cattlemen's Association's (USCA) petition to the USDA to restrict the…
TANZANIA - Tanzania has formally lifted the ban on meat product imports from some specific processing facilities in South Africa following the outbreak of listeriosis declared in the country by the Minister of Health early last year. A statement from the Tanzania Food and Drugs Authority (TFDA) however indicated that imports from some factories associated…
CHINA - China has announced plans to impose anti-dumping duties on broiler chicken products imported from Brazil citing an investigation that indicated increasing imports were damaging the domestic poultry industry. Bloomberg reported that the Ministry of Commerce said that importers would now have to pay deposits of between 18.8 to 38.4% on purchases to Chinese…
USA - The US government in collaboration with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has launched the USDA Harmonized Good Agricultural Practices Audit Program (USDA H-GAP) as part of their strategy to strengthen food safety. The announcement made by Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue and FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb,…
