Government claims new lab to reveal unhealthy production
By Gvantsa Gabekhadze
Monday, July 13
The current Georgian government claims that it is taking steps forward in the process of detecting unhealthy food.
The officials stress that Georgia is now better equipped to diagnose plant pests and avoid plant diseases than in previous years.
Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili opened a new phytosanitary laboratory in Tbilisi together with the Agriculture Minister OtarDanelia a couple of days ago.
The major aim of the lab is to strengthen food safety and phytosanitary control on plant pests.
According to the PM’s press service, more than two million GEL was invested in the project that was supported by the European Union (EU). Meanwhile the Georgian state allocated 800, 000 GEL in this project.
The PM said food safety was one of the main priorities for the Government.
"We do our best to help the farmers and to take care of Georgian customers at the same time. Nothing was done during the years in the food safety direction. Now we opened a new laboratory. In the course of last two years more than one billion GEL was invested into the development of Georgia’s agriculture,” said Garibashvili.
Agriculture Minister said this was the first phytosanitary laboratory in Georgia of such capacity and possibilities.
" It was the recommendation of the EU. We had deadline until the end of the year to implement the recommendation, however we did it earlier. This laboratory will enable us to conduct a complete research on plants,” said Danelia.
General Director of Mediterranean Plant Protection Organisation Martin Ward claims that the laboratory is fully available for any kind of plant pests’ identification.
Some analysts say that the Georgian market is full of products dangerous for health. It is also hard to differentiate which product is genetically modified or not, they say.
The current government members used to say that in some cases such products were revealed. However, there was less possibility of testing the production in a special lab.
Although the government takes the steps to improve the situation: amend the legislation and install appropriate facilities.
