Food standards hastened
The Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives Ministry is accelerating its project to draw up national standards for agricultural goods and food to certify high quality throughout the production chain after Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) members accepted Thai food-safety standards.
So far 110 standard codes under the Q mark have been implemented to certify good agricultural practice (GAP), which has also been granted to 260,000 farms and 1,000 packing houses.Sorapol Teraphat, director of the National Bureau of Agricultural Commodity and Food Standards, said Thailand's food-safety standards were intended to convince local and export markets. The standards have been drawn up to rely upon international standard requirements such as Codex, OIE Standards and International Plant Protection Convention. "Thai standards are relevant to international requirements. As a result our trading partners in Apec such as Japan, Australia, Singapore, Taiwan and Vietnam now accept Thai food standards," Sorapol said, adding that this would boost Thai exports in the long run. The 110 Q-mark standard codes have been granted to the livestock sector (30), fisheries (30), plants (23) and others (27). They are based on GAP, good manufacturing practice and hazard analysis critical control point.
|
