The Rosselkhoznadzor to the load

The General Prosecutor office checked the status of legality in the sphere of protection of the rights of entrepreneurs in the implementation of the national audit by the Rosselkhoznadzor and announced the identification of a number of violations of the requirements of the law on protection of rights of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs. According to participants of the agricultural sector, interviewed byThe DairyNews, the business, including dairy, would feel more comfortable with a clear separation of the functions of such agencies as the Rosselkhoznadzor and the Rospotrebnadzor, or with the abolition of the latter and the establishment of a new joint supervision body, with a more efficient system of working and interacting with entrepreneurs.

Among the claims of the General Prosecutor office there were listed inspections of small businesses scheduled by the departments of the Rosselkhoznadzor in the regions, despite a moratorium on their implementation until 2018. Unscheduled inspections according to prosecutors, the agricultural Department also holds without legitimate reason. Such violations the General Prosecutor office revealed in Ivanovo, Kemerovo, Kurgan, Leningrad, Murmansk, Omsk, Sakhalin and Ulyanovsk regions, in Dagestan, Chuvashia, Tuva, Khakassia, Khabarovsk region and Jewish Autonomous region and in Saint-Petersburg. In addition, the General Prosecutor office noted in a number of cases the fact of ignoring by the Rosselkhoznadzor the possibility of replacing the fine with a warning. All this suggests that the Agency increases the burden on businesses, according to the General Prosecutor office.

"I agree that the Rosselkhoznadzor conducting extra tests and monitoring, creates an additional burden on business. One could simply have product identification. It will be much cheaper and easier, and it will be easier for the manufacturer," - said in comments toThe DairyNews Pavel Petukhov, Deputy Director for development of "Hema".

We will remind that earlier The DairyNews repeatedly reported about the statements of Rosselkhoznadzor on the detection of milk powder in the products of large companies. In February, the Deputy head of the Rosselkhoznadzor Nikolay Vlasov called the problem of the dairy industry the use of milk powder in the absence of appropriate control methods.

Note that the large Russian companies of the dairy processing industry, made statements that Rosselhoznadzor uses undocumented methods, accusing the plants of using milk powder. Later Rosstandart registered the method for determining the concentration of milk powder in products.

"In my opinion, the Rosselkhoznadzor and Rospotrebnadzor have double functions. They often get involved with each other, and this prevents the development of production. I think their functions should be divided more clearly. The Rosselkhoznadzor should be limited to raw materials, and the Rospotrebnadzor should deal with finished products," - said Alexander Nikitin, the member of the Board of Directors of GC "Alantal" in an interview with The DairyNews.

In Russia, stressed Igor Rybakov, the President of LLC "ESS Provincial", there is not even doubling but tripling the functions of Supervisory agencies: Rospotrebnadzor, Rostekhnadzor and Rosselkhonadzor.

"If you look closely at their functions, you will see that they have a crossing. The dairy industry is disturbed by unnecessary inspections: the money is spent, the time is spent, they require different researches and so on. In my opinion, merging of the Rosselkhoznadzor and Rospotrebnadzor would be appropriate, because the Rospotrebnadzor is an anachronism, perhaps, of only our state. The veterinary service exists everywhere; it has existed since the moment as the society was engaged in farming. The Rospotrebnadzor is an artificial entity, is not typical for most countries of the world. First of all, it will help to reduce the number of officials and reduce the tax burden," - suggested Igor Rybakov.

According to market participants, the hulking machine of the Supervisory authorities in Russia – in part the legacy of the Soviet era. How it works today in a vast country like Russia, it depends on the regional authorities.

The Rosselkhoznadzor is extremely essential for the industry organization, believes Vladimir Manaenkov, Executive Director of the National Feed Union.

"The question is how effectively the Agency is operating. The Rosselkhoznadzor is on the protection of the health of citizens. In my opinion, it should also help the business. That is, we must always be in touch with industry associations and set those tasks that would have solved the safety issues for food and would facilitate the work of the business. Unfortunately, we are unable in some cases to find mutual understanding – we are listened to as if in half. In fact, to talk about the Rosselkhoznadzor in general is not possible, because it is represented by individual people who are completely different," - said Vladimir Manaenkov.

The issue of excessive control should be investigated in each case separately, states Mushegh Mamikonyan, President of the Meat Board of the Common economic space.

"Taking into account the biological risks that exist in animal husbandry, especially in our country, naturally these issues are resolved by strengthening the regulatory impact of controllers. Consumers today want to be more informed about the conditions under which the animals grew up, how the products were produced. This is called traceability. Naturally, these are new costs to business. Once the application of information technologies in industry was difficult, because it was uncomfortable for some people but later they got used to it. Accordingly, the passage of time imposes on the controller the duties that it needs to do to keep up with the market. Of course, it should be split into stages and it will be necessary to change quite a lot, and not only from the side of one Department, because the country is quickly becoming digital. In this regard, new methods to monitor the movement of goods, the new methods of controlling the spread of biological risks become the responsibility of the Rosselkhoznadzor. They are always engaged in a dialogue with the business about what their rate is and how it is implemented. There are some disagreements, but in any case, the goals that the Rosselkhoznadzor sets and has by Charter, they should be implemented. Redundant or non-redundant – probably, each case must be analysed," - said the President of the Meat Council.

Meanwhile, the Rosselkhoznadzor has stated that the service has analyzed the information revealed by the General Prosecutor office of the Russian Federation about violations of the Federal law of 26.12.2008 № 294-FZ "On protection of rights of legal entities and individual entrepreneurs when exercising state control (supervision) and municipal control", brought it to the attention of the heads of territorial offices of the Service and requested them to take urgent measures to eliminate violations in this area and to prevent them in the future.

"The execution of the mentioned order is under control. From executives, mentioned in the report of the territorial administrations of the Rosselkhoznadzor there were requested explanations on the issue of violations of the Law №294, according to the results of the analysis there will be conducted inspections to verify the activities of these officers and taken disciplinary measures," - said in the press service of Rosselkhoznadzor.

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