By Libya Herald reporter.
Tunis, 26 September 2016:
The Tripoli-based Food and Drugs Control Centre has called on the authorities to ban sales of fruit and vegetables from Egypt because of concerns about contamination and claims that officials at the Musaid border crossing with Egypt are not carrying out checks on imports.
Misrata municipal council has already barred Egyptian products from local shops on the same basis.
The moves follow bans by Saudi Arabia and the US after the US Department of Agriculture said that it had found that some Egyptian agricultural products were irrigated with sewage water. In Saudi Arabia, there have been reports of funerary products being discoverd in Egyptian cheese.
Russia has also imposed a ban, although this is seen largely politically motivated. It follows Egypt’s rejection of a shipment of Russian flour said to be contaminated with the toxic substance ergot.
There are claims that the Libyan moves are, in part, also politically driven, in this case because of Egypt’s support for Khalifa Hafter and the Libya National Army in the east of the country.
The food and drugs authority has also classed a number of Egyptian drinks and other processed consumables as unfit for human consumption on the basis that they contain banned additives. There was, though, no concern about them until now.
In reality, however, the move against Egyptian produce is unlikely to have any great effect.
Most fresh fruit and vegetable imports in the west of the country come from Tunisia. Those from Egypt go to the east where there is no sign of the Beida-based administration intending to impose any such ban.
