After years of preparations and numerous inspections, the Chinese AQSIQ has officially announced that fresh Polish apples are allowed for import to China, according to The Polish State Inspectorate of Plant Health and Seed (Państwowa Inspekcja Ochrony Roślin i Nasiennictwa).
A list was published by the AQSIQ (General Bureau of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the PRC), of all of the 453 Polish orchards and 135 Polish packers, thus making trade official.
The application for trade between the two countries began back in August 2014. Since then, there have been intense negotiations and numerous meetings between the AQSIQ and the Polish Ministry of Agriculture. After a successful phytosanitary audit on 20 June, 2016, protocol was signed between the two countries.
"The process was unique because the approach for the agreement was more like the procedure for animal origin products rather than the standard fruit and veg trade requirements. What this means is that extra phytosanitary inspections were made, along with orchard inspections and additional audits for the packhouses. This means that apples from Poland to China have full traceability from the place of origin, which is quite unique," shared Marek Marzec, founder of Ewa-bis, one of the Polish apple exporters to China.
"I think that the good political relationship between Poland and China helped move this trade agreement forward. There were multiple visits between the Chinese and Polish Presidents throughout the process. Just last week there was a meeting between the Polish and Chinese prime ministers, where the Polish PM requested that the trade agreement be expedited and to open the market as soon as possible, which I think helped speed up the announcement."
According to the information received by the Polish Embassy in Beijing, this is by far the fastest conducted the negotiation process for the admission of fresh fruit or vegetables to the Chinese market among all EU Member States.
