The quality of poultry meat from Poland raised questions from Romania

Over the past three months, the number of cases of infection with Salmonella Enteritidis and Salmonella Typhimurium in poultry meat from Poland has increased by 40% compared to the same period last year.

The National Veterinary Sanitary and Food Safety Authority (ANSVSA) of Romania has decided to tighten controls on the import of poultry meat from Poland following several incidents over the past few months. The Agency has received a number of notifications through the European Food and Feed Rapid Alert System (RASFF) regarding products that have been sent to Romania.

According to ANSVSA, compared to August-October last year, in the same period in 2021, the number of warnings about poultry meat products from Poland increased by about 40 percent.

Since the beginning of this year, Romania has received 28 reports via RASFF concerning poultry meat or eggs contaminated with Salmonella Enteritidis or Salmonella Typhimurium, Romanian officials said. In September and October of this year there were almost 50 reports of salmonella in poultry products from Poland on the RASFF portal. Most were hosted by Poland under its own official control, but France, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Latvia and Germany were other notifying countries.

Poland is the largest producer of poultry meat in the EU with a market share of 19%. ANSVSA has begun to strengthen official controls in cold stores, supermarket logistics centers, poultry processing plants to reduce the risk to public health. The agency did not specify how long these checks will last.