During his working visit to the Russian Federation on January 20 Armen Hayrapetyan, the Head of the State Service for Food Safety of MOA, RA (hereinafter Service) met Sergey Dankvert, the Head of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance of the Russian Federation.
Issues related to bilateral in particular scientific-technical cooperation between the Republic of Armenia and the Russian Federation were discussed during the meeting. The sides stressed the importance and effectiveness to consolidate efforts in order to control introduction and spread of acute infectious diseases of animals. For this purpose, the Federal Center for Animal Health Protection of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance will produce new vaccine by the request of the Republic of Armenia for the prevention of FMD which will also contain a new FMD virus strain belonging to genetic lineage AG VII. The existence of this type of strain is a priority for Armenia, as FMD cases with that type of strain has recently regularly been recorded in neighboring countries – the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Turkey. The vaccine used in the Republic till now would not provide the proper immunity of animals.
Armen Hayrapetyan informed that by the financial assistance allocated in the scopes of EEU the laboratory of the Service has been reequppied which will provide a new level of food and biological safety.
During the negotiations, an agreement was reached between the parties that Nikolai Vlasov, the Deputy Head of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance will arrive in Armenia in the upcoming days to discuss the cooperation perspectives and other issues between the two Services.
The partners also discussed current issues of bilateral cooperation referring to food import and export. The necessity of creating a unified information system was touched upon as well, which will ensure full traceability of products in EEU territory and will strengthen the control in this field.