News

Fruitful meeting with NZ MPI: AG

August 12, 2015 12:55 am

The government is hopeful that New Zealand will soon lift a ban on the importation of four Fijian commodities.

The Minister for Public Enterprises, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum met with officials from New Zealand’s Primary Industry Ministry about the ban in Nadi this morning.

Sayed-Khaiyum says an issue that has been highlighted is a lack of proper communication between the authorities engaged with the exports.

Article continues after advertisement

“MPI NZ – some of their officers have been engaged in so we’ve established that, that obviously the competent authority in Fiji for biosecurity matters is BAF itself and that all lines of communication should be coming through BAF. We found that there were some lines of communication from MPI that was not following the proper protocol – so we have established that there will be communication essentially consolidating that line of communication.”

Sayed-Khaiyum says NZ officials have been informed that the suspension in this case is not necessarily appropriate.

New Zealand banned the importation of commodities last week claiming anomalies in the documentation for shipment.

New Zealand MPI officials are now meeting Natures Way Cooperative Fiji Limited which carries out mandatory quarantine treatment of Fiji’s fruits and vegetables export industry.