The Government of Brazil is planning to introduce a self-monitoring system for agricultural producers and meat packers, following an inspection scandal that hurt its business with core markets.
Agriculture Minister Tereza Cristina Dias said the government plans to send draft legislation on self-monitoring to Congress in the first half of this financial year.
Dias said: “Why can’t Brazil do self-monitoring when Europe and the United States use it?”
The country’s meat exporting industry, which is the world’s largest, came under federal scanner for its alleged involvement in bribery to overlook unsanitary conditions and falsified inspection results.
This scandal threatened the country’s $15bn exports to markets such as China and Europe when shipments were halted pending a review of Brazilian’s inspection protocols.
Dias told the news publication: “Our agriculture sector can provide guarantees. Just because of one episode we shouldn’t demonise Brazil’s food industry.”
Major Brazilian meatpacking companies JBS and BRF have been both implicated in the scrutiny.
The federal probe started in 2017 and was expanded in 2018.
It is scrutinising the relations between food companies and laboratories that are required to certify the safety of meat in markets such as Japan, the Middle East and Europe.
The Agriculture Minister is yet to commence negotiations with the European Union over lifting its embargo on Brazilian chicken imports, as the new Brazilian government is still drafting its policies.
Dias added: “We have to find a middle ground going forward because Brazil cannot lose markets. What we need is to open new markets.”
