According to information provided by Digi24, only 10% of fruits and vegetables imported by Romania are currently controlled by phytosanitary inspectors.
Inspection reports revealed that apples, tomatoes and oranges top the list of foods that contain the most pesticides. While most of the apples with a large amount of pesticides are Romanian, the remaining fruits, mainly citrus, are imported from non-EU countries.
Achim Irimescu, Minister of Agriculture stated that "there are risks involved in failing to control pesticide limits, and given the recent cases, affecting products like oranges, it could become necessary to enforce stricter controls."
Andrei Butaru, President of ANSVSA, said: "We control imports from all countries, not only from Turkey, but also from European and third countries; we are currently looking at more than 480 samples. Yet, it is not possible to control every single piece: something which is not done anywhere in the world."
In the first 10 months of last year, Romania imported close to 160 thousand tonnes of citrus. A third of these are purchased from Turkey.
Despite the controls, there are cases in which food contaminated with pesticide reaches the retailers. It happened in 2013, when 365 kilos of pears reached the shelves. The year before, it happened also with 120 tonnes of grapefruit from Turkey.
